TONY KING: ‘I THOUGHT I WAS GOING TO DIE’
Mark Clairmont | MuskokaTODAY.com
MUSKOKA — Hospital workers got a great shout-out from someone who knows the pandemic pressures they’re under first hand.
The king of local beer and spirits sales heaped high praise on them after the leukemia survivor suffered a severe setback decades after putting it in the remission penalty box.
Tony King is self-isolating two weeks at home for a different reason, after a near-death experience where he said he said his prayers.
“I honestly thought I was going to die.”
Tony posted the following on Facebook late Saturday night.:
“The rumours of my demise have been greatly exaggerated.
Its time I set the record straight and apologize to my friends for taking so long to do so. Everything happened so quickly; it’s been quite a ride.
About a month ago I was diagnosed with cancer and booked for surgery for the removal of a life-threatening oral carcinoma and the removal all the lymph nodes on the right side of my neck.
Three hours of surgery and three days in the hospital with a month off to recover was the original plan.
The original operation went well, two hours longer than planned, but well – that was March 12 at 1pm. In the early morning hours following, my neck started to swell, and I couldn’t breathe.
I could see my neck at the end of my nose! It was a hematoma in the vein linking the two main arteries.
They had to reopen the stitches at bedside to release the blood drowning me. Blood was just a flying!
Out of the room and down the halls to elevators and down seven floors for emergency surgery. It was just like the movies! CODE BLUE BABY!
I honestly thought I was going to die in that elevator (memories of the elevator scene from Steven Kings the Shining circa 1980).
I made peace with dying. I really did. It’s funny how time goes by when stressed like that. It wasn’t a long trip to the O.R. but seemed to take forever until they got me on the table, and I snapped. I couldn’t breathe.
Took seven of them to hold me down while they forced the breathing tube down my nose without freezing. That broke my nose.
I was squeezing a pour little nurses’ hand so hard a sprained her fingers.
First time (and hopefully last) that I ever yell “just knock me the f-ck out PLEASE!!!”
They kept me unconscious for all of Friday, I lost the entire day, which is weird.
The nursing staff at Toronto General Hospital are angels, and thanks to Dr. Irish and his team that saved my life.
I tried to keep the nurses laughing during my stay which helped pass the time.
Thanks to my GBSC family for all the support and setting Mom & Dad / Tracy up at the hotel.
Thanks to Mom & Dad and Tracy for being there for me, I’d have been lost without you.
Quarantined for 2 weeks at home then off for a couple more (maybe).
Look forward to seeing you when all this shit is behind us.
King-size hugs from Muskoka (two metres away though!)”
Email Mark Clairmont at mark@muskokatoday.com
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Pic was just before original procedure obviously. LOL
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