Contact Card

This site was formerly about the projects and ideas I had floating around in my head or was presently working on; that is changing. I have since abandoned most minor ideas because of a lack of time and resources.

It has been a bad few years for everyone of late, and I have been hit particularly hard.

In 2018, I began to help more with Dad's Alzheimer's. Dad passed away on his and Mom's anniversary in 2019 from Alzheimer's after almost a decade and a half. He remains one of the best men I ever knew. I have mixed memories of his last few years, but I choose to hold on to the best of them.

By the summer of 2018, I began having increasing muscle difficulty with my legs, dizziness upon standing, fainting, and vision issues. A few days before Christmas 2019, I woke up with severe pain in my right glute. Later that day, my right glute had the appearance of someone trying to smuggle a cantaloupe out in their shorts. I managed to drive myself to the doctor's office, was refused, and went on to the ER in Augusta. After a CT scan showed gas in the tissue, I was transported to Doctor's Hospital's Joseph M Still Burn Center. The diagnosis: Necrotizing fasciitis due to streptococcus G. My surgeon informed me I was just a few hours from breaching the fascial wall and likely death. Two days later, on Christmas Eve, I went back to Edgefield with simply a crutch and a giant hole in my butt cheek.

On New Year's Day, Mom called to tell me her scanner was not working and that she was having problems with her printer. I tried to diagnose the issue over the phone, to no avail. As I was gathering things for, presumably, a day trip back home, I turned, heard a crack, and suddenly collapsed. Remarkably, I was able to stand shortly thereafter. I then drove the four hours back home.

Come the next morning, I had extreme difficulty standing up. Soon, I was unable to stand. I canceled a wound care appointment and then called EMS to extricate me from the recliner I was sitting on. I went to the local hospital. Sitting up caused such pain it made me blackout after screaming in pain and curling into a fetal position. I would not stand again on my own until Father's Day 2020.

Total diagnosis: Schmidt’s syndrome, osteopenia, cauda equina, and Multiple Sclerosis were added to my diagnoses. Later, primary immune failure would be added to the mix, but that came after.

14 surgeries, and a year and a half before the wound completely closed, and I still have 3 butt cheeks. Sitting is quite painful. I used to spend my time working any number of volunteer functions.