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Mark left for his annual 3 week visit home, called when he got there, all was good. I received a phone call 8 hours later from a very frightened Mark who was calling me from the health clinic. A few hours after telling me he had arrived, he suffered severe chest pressure and tingling. He wisely took an aspirin and his brother took him to the clinic where an ultrascan told them he had 2 blocked arteries and was not suffering a heart attack. (later it was confirmed that he DID have a heart attack). But he needed to go immediately to the cardiac hospital in Izmir, nearby city, for an angioplasty. He told them he needed to call his wife first - and this was this phone call.
I assured him, but more likely myself, that he would be ok and this was a normal procedure to do. He said it would cost $1500, so I told him that was a deal - get 2 (which ironically he did). He said they were waiting for him to stop talking with me to put him in the ambulance for the trip to Izmir. Our goodbyes were tentative.
After about 4 hours, I started wondering how I would find out the results. His family doesnt speak english, and I dont speak turkish. hmmm... I remembered that nephew Ali in Istanbul knows some english from working at a tourist hotel, and is on facebook alot. To facebook I went! Ali was online and when i asked him how uncle was doing, he said - I'll call my dad because he is with uncle. His facebook update was: uncle is good. aunt should not worry. uncle is in intensive care for 3 days.
yikes! At that point, I didnt know the results of the procedure, but now knew that Mark was out and recovering. I told Ali - I need to talk with uncle as soon as possible. The following day I got a phone call, and there was the Turk telling me he was fine. He was plugged in from everywhere, but felt fine and would talk with me again when he got released and was home. He depended on his brother to visit during visiting time with his cell phone. So we had a window of about 15 minutes to talk
Only in subsequent phone calls have I learned what was done and the details that help the story become real for me. The staff in ICU made fun of Mark's odd turkish accent (odd because of all the time he spent in Germany growing up) so he told them he was American. To them, this now made sense. He tells of the ambulance ride with his brother, the immediate admission to surgery when they arrived and the first class care he felt he received. In fact, he got a CD of his procedure.
And then he told me what the doctor said - no flying home for 6 weeks. The long term pressure of the flight over had caused the reaction, tho his arteries were already closed. With the angioplasty, they needed the arteries to settle after the stents were inserted, before they would be ready for the long term pressure of flying home.
Today, we had our first Skype call - so I finally got to see him since he left 2 1/2 weeks ago. My turk looks great and sound great. His latest doctor visit was good, but reinforced the 6 weeks no fly zone. He is taking advantage of the longer time to visit more people. He will go to Istanbul this week to visit nephew Ali. He is helping the family with their vegetable farming - peppers, tomatoes, eggplants. So, he is now enjoying his visit and it seems they are now enjoying it too. Me - the next 3 1/2 weeks will be long.
