Before I fell asleep, my mom, Lindy, wrote me a one-sentence email.
The email from my mom
From: Lindy Lumbert
To: Hunter Hogan
Sent: 20 Dec 2014 18:49:48 -0800 (PST)
Subject: Re: congrats are in order
Are you still in Cairo?
My reply
From: Hunter Hogan
To: Lindy Lumbert
Subject: Re: congrats are in order
No. And the fact that you don’t know what I have not been in Cairo for over six months produces feelings in me that I do not have words to describe.
Mom, you would have died in 2011 if not for the actions of a very few people. The most important person is Melanie. She has the intelligence and the courage to refuse to listen to you and to take you to the hospital. If she had waited a few more hours, you would have died of dehydration: without exaggeration, she saved your live but you fought her the entire time. I have no idea if you have thanked her for what she did, but she did one of the most difficult things in her entire life. She loves you deeply and she did not not want to go against your wishes. Furthermore, she mostly agrees with you that conventional medicine is bad, so for her to place her faith in medical doctors took a lot of courage. She was pretty sure you would be upset with her for taking you to the hospital, but she was will willing to sacrifice her relationship with you so that you would live. Her love for you is profound.
Taking you to the hospital while you were so sick and while you were fighting her the entire time was emotionally devastating for her. Having to face grandma made things even more difficult for her. She was very smart though and one of the things she did with her last strength was to reach out to me. I knew you and I knew her and I immediately recognized the seriousness of the situation. Dave and I drove down there. Dave’s presence was useful and possibly even necessary. But if Dave had gone without me, you would have died.
Once Melanie wisely got you to the hospital, I was the only friend or family you had who understood enough about medicine, science, medical law, business, insurance, and how to deal with people to get you the help you needed. Melanie and Dave both helped.Their help was necessary and I probably could not have done things alone. Even my dad helped indirectly because he supported Dave and I. While their help was almost certainly necessary, it was not sufficient. I was the only person who understood the science well enough to interrogate the nurses and doctors. My questions were so sophisticated and well-informed that 90% of the questions I asked the nurses were answered with, “I don’t know how that works, so you will have to ask the doctor.” When I spoke with the general practitioner, he could only answer 50% of my questions and regularly referred me to the specialists. He quickly made a habit of avoiding your room if I were in the room. Furthermore, my constant questions caused him to make dozens of phone calls to try to find you a better hospital because he knew his hospital could not save your life–for example, his hospital only had a neurosurgeon who worked one day per week.
When I spoke with the specialist, most especially the infectious diseases specialist, they all explicitly said that they were shocked at how much I understood about medicine. I know that my discussions with them caused them to re-evaluate the perspective of your case and to look for other causes of your illness and to use diagnostic tests they would nor normally use. It was one of the non-standard tests that gave the first real clue as to what your disease was.
Once you were transferred, things improved dramatically. I should mention that I someone had to consent to your transfer and Melanie, Dave, and Grandma all insisted that I alone make the decision. I would have happily shared the decision with them, but they were too scared. I was also scared, but I did not want you to die or to suffer, so I tried to make the best decision I could make. It ended up being a good decision.
At the new hospital, you were in a much improved environment. The support staff had better training as practitioners, even though their knowledge of medicine was not more sophisticated: the most common answer to my questions was still, “I don’t know, ask the doctor.” But the support staff was not flustered and made an effort to connect me wit doctors. Furthermore, the doctors were much more willing to say, “I don’t know, but I will work with you to find out the answer.” Any professional–doctor, lawyer, accountant, architect, and other, who is confident enough to admit ignorance and compassionate enough to work together to find a solution is likely so be someone you should trust.
Side note: my typos are increasing, my thinking is slower-not defective-but slower. I can feel myself falling sleep. My guess is that this will be incomplete.My visionn id getting lurry.
I was about to start my second semester of an LL.M. and I was days away from giving destimony in the ARDC investigtion but you were witjout dount more omportant to me. I wm veru ssd tsat I lost my relatonship with you but I don nto regrete going to houston. When the surgeon cam to use witg a diagnosis, it was complicated. No more than five people on the enire world had ever had a medical condition like yours. It was impossible to weigh the options. We had two choices: do nothing and/or ccontiuine to tret witj powerful amtibiostiox. jhe other eas highy invision braid sergery–one of the most dangerous in the world. Progranosis: no surgery equals death within six hours. Surgery was blead and likely a serious of surgeries thst woud change my mother. 1`q
I fell asleep
I don’t remember writing the last few sentences and I don’t remember clicking the send button. The last three characters are in the actual email and I have no idea why. I love my mom, and it hurts me deeply that she does not even know the most basic facts about my life. It hurts me even more deeply that despite her lack of knowledge of basic facts that she regularly criticizes me and my life–and she is almost always wrong about the facts. It would be easier for me to handle if she (and other people) criticized me for things that I have actually done, but when they condemn me for things that are not true, I do not know how to deal with it.
