I Thought I Left: A Different Kind of Near Death Experience

I THOUGHT I LEFT

By

Jef Meulemans

* * * * *

PUBLISHED BY:

Jef Meulemans on Smashwords

I Thought I Left

Copyright © 2013 by Jef Meulemans

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Table of Contents

Prologue

Day 1 – The Day The Earth Stood Still

Day 2 – Who Am I And Why Am I Here

Day 3 – Wait, It Gets Worse

Day 4 – Group Or Not To Group

Day 5 – Cuckoo’s Nest With A Gym

Day 6 – Transferred To Hell

Day 7 – My Time With Arnold Schwarzenegger

Day 8 – Big Mac And Malted Milk Balls

Epilogue

About The Author

Prologue

This is the story about one piece of my life. It is a very small but important piece. It is not just about suicide; the act itself can be described in just a page or two; but rather the events immediately after my attempt to end my life. I by no means intend to glamorize suicide; in fact I am quite remorseful and embarrassed by what happened. At no point in the 48 years prior to this event did I ever even imagine I would find myself behind the wheel of a car breathing exhaust gas and wishing I would die.

Having said that, I will say that I’ve always been curious about suicide. Ever since my own grandfather ended his life when I was a young boy I have wondered what goes through someone’s mind when they make that decision. At that moment are they happy? At that moment are they sad? How much pain are they really in? What does it feel like? Do they have second thoughts?

I wrote this book for two reasons. First, it was part of my own personal therapy. I wanted to get everything out of my head and onto paper where it is easier for me to organize and process. My second reason for writing this was to answer those questions for others who might have them.

Some readers will no doubt think that I had little reason to end my life. That is true. In fact as I write this, I can think of no legitimate reason for anyone to end their life. I will say however that not all the events of my life have been documented here. Some of the things I was struggling with on that cold day in January are too personal for me to share. Even so, as I look at them now, I realize that even those added did not justify my actions.

Life is really about perception; perception of one’s self as well as one’s perception of others. Many things can alter those perceptions. One thing that is notorious for altering perception is depression. For me, depression was like looking at life through a magnifying glass and not realizing it. The glass kept growing and growing fueled by another drug I was taking for Attention Deficit Disorder.

I’ve always relied on my sense of humor to get me through tough times. I got my sense of humor from my mom and it’s one of the aspects about me that I am most proud. As my magnifying glass grew, my sense of humor faded. As I look back now it is so easy to see; I can’t believe I missed it. I can’t believe anyone around me missed it. But it happened too slowly to notice and as you will see, it started to return as soon as I began treatment.

If this book does not entertain you then I hope it satisfies your curiosity. It certainly satisfied mine.

Day 1 -- The Day The Earth Stood Still

I woke up in the hospital behind an oxygen mask with a big bag on it. A nurse said hello and removed the mask. She told the medic to replace it with a breathing tube and for a minute I panicked thinking they were going to shove something down my throat. The breathing tube turned out to be that little tube with the two vents that they shove up your nose and around your head. Another medic was replacing the IV bag leading to yet another tube in my right hand. My first thought was that I must have been out for a while if I’d already gone through a whole IV bag and my second thought was, ‘Well, at least I didn’t have to suffer the pain of having that damn needle shoved into the back of my hand.’

There was one nurse, two medics and a security guard. How odd, I thought. The guard was in his early sixties with neatly combed white hair and a pressed uniform. I’m not exactly sure what his purpose was or what the procedure is for something like this but I’m guessing it was to protect me from myself. When I find myself alone with strangers I have a habit of giving them a name in my own mind, just for identification purposes. This guy looked like a Stan to me. Right about the time I named him, my subconscious told me to listen to what was being said by the nurse. I wasn’t really listening to this point but the message from my brain was one of those ‘hey fool, you better pay attention’ kind of messages. I heard, ...hold one leg and you hold the other and just keep them steady. What? Huh?

Mr. Jef, we are going to have to insert a catheter. You will feel some discomfort for just a moment.

And by God she was right. Just then I did feel some discomfort although I think it could be more accurately described as SLOW AND STEADY SEARING PAIN! My knees both came up off the table even with the two goons holding them down.

So Mr. Jef, tell me what happened, the nurse asked as she stripped the latex gloves off of her hands. I said nothing.

You tried to kill yourself?

Yes, yes I did.

Uh huh, with carbon monoxide?

Uh huh.

Did you take anything else, any pills or anything? she asked as she wrote in her folder.

No, nothing. Just then another nurse walked in and whispered something to the nurse who was asking me questions.

Mr. Jef, your wife is here, do you want her back here with you or would you rather she not come back? My nurse asked.

Sure, she can come back, I said.

The other nurse left and moments later my wife came in. I tried not to make eye contact but I just couldn’t help it. The look on her face was angry. I knew it would be.

I talked to your ex-wife and she let your daughter know what happened she said as she entered the room.

The thought of my daughter hearing about this hurt me and I swallowed hard to keep from crying. I definitely looked away then.

The nurse continued, Is this the first time you have ever tried to kill yourself?

Yes.

When did you first start having thoughts of suicide?

I started thinking about it last night.

Do you feel like you want to hurt or kill yourself right now?

No.

Do you feel like you want to hurt or kill anyone else?

I wanted to say, ‘Don’t we all’ but I didn’t think it was a good time to try and be funny or sarcastic. No I said.

Who found you and pulled you out of the car?

My wife answered before I could, He called his ex-wife from the car. She called her sister who called the sheriff’s office. They drove out and found him in the pasture.

Then she looked at me and said, Why did you drive out there to do this?

I didn’t want to be seen and figured it was the best place.

The nurse looked at my wife and said, He will have to be hospitalized for this, but at a different facility.

Oh, I know my wife replied.

He’ll need enough clothes for a few days, can you bring them?

Sure, I’ll have to drive home. It’s a twenty minute drive.

It will take a while for him to be evaluated anyway, take your time the nurse said.

Then the nurse looked back at me and said, There is a nurse coming from Ridgeview Hospital to evaluate you. She will be here in about twenty to thirty minutes. Do you have insurance Mr. Mulemans?

My name is actually pronounced Mel-mens but I have learned to accept almost anything close; Me-loo-mans, Mule-lee-mens, Meeuu-aaaa-laa(and stop).

It’s in the glove box of my car. I haven’t had a chance to put it in my wallet yet.

My wife said, I will get it when I pick up his clothes.

Are you hungry Mr. Mule-mens?

Yes, I was famished.

The nurse left leaving me in the room with just my wife and the security guard. As she angrily rolled up my pants and the T-shirt the medics had cut away, she started in on me.

This was really chicken shit Jef. How did you think that was going to solve anything? You were just going to just leave everything on me. Cowardly.

That’s one way to look at it. I replied.

Then the security guard stepped forward and said, Ma’am, not now. Just gather his things and do what you have to do.

And with that my wife left the room. Stan the guard turned to me and smiled and I wanted to cry. Instead I dozed off.

* * * *

In 1980, I moved to Atlanta from Columbus Georgia. I’d been out of the Air Force a couple of years and was still trying to find my way. While in Columbus, I met a girl from Atlanta. Her name was Natalie. Our relationship grew fast and she convinced me to move to Atlanta. Since I hated my life in Columbus, I was easily convinced. I arrived in Atlanta in the middle of the night on a bus with a box of clothes, a guitar and enough money to rent a room. I took a job at McDonalds. The job didn’t even pay enough to meet my rent, Natalie had to help out.

In Columbus, I worked a construction job. The heat and humidity were really hard on this boy from Wisconsin. I wanted an office job. The problem was, most office jobs required typing skills; 45 words per minute and I wasn’t there. I saw an ad in the paper for a free typing course, guaranteed to improve your speed to a minimum of 45 words per minute. The course was offered by Kelly Temporary Services and the fine print included an agreement to work for them for three months. I became a Kelly Girl.

I was assigned to work as a supply clerk for a new insurance company. There were 40 employees and after my three-month period, I was hired fulltime as employee number 41. I ascended the corporate ladder with breakneck speed and enjoyed the economic boom that was the 1980’s. Within five years I was an underwriting supervisor, five years after that, a director. Natalie and I had a daughter but even that didn’t save our marriage. We divorced after eight years. I had become President of the Georgia Life Underwriters and was at the pinnacle of my career when I decided to move into the field of Information Technology.

By age 32 I had remarried and had another daughter. Soon after, problems overtook that marriage as well. I saw a pattern emerging and went to a doctor who diagnosed me with depression. I started taking Prozac but the problems merely lessoned. At some point my mother sent me a magazine article about Attention Deficit Disorder. In the margins she had written, This is you!!! I took it to my doctor and he added Ritalin to my medications. The doctor told me that undiagnosed A.D.D. can in itself cause depression and since I was not seeing much benefit to the Prozac, I eventually stopped taking it. Even with counseling, the problems in our marriage continued and we divorced after six years.

And so it went relationship after failed relationship. By age 43 I had been through several of them. I had to take a part-time job just to make my child support payments. By age 46 I had been taking Ritalin for over 15 years. My career had not only slowed down but was in trouble. I was not getting along with my bosses. Soon I was relegated to working by myself with little if any supervision. After 24 years with the company I was a recluse in a cubicle. I was working three nights a week and weekends part-time. In order to get to the part-time job on time, I had to leave work early. I was doing all this while trying to maintain a relationship with my current wife. Right before I turned 47, things began to unravel.

I was first called on the carpet for my attendance. My new boss finally noticed I was missing in the late afternoons three times a week. I was written up and put on probation. I was appalled at the very notion that I was on probation. After all, I had been there for 24 years. Longer than my boss, longer than the boss’s boss, longer than the boss’s boss’s boss. Nonetheless, I towed the line and made some changes with my part-time job and became a model employee, or so I thought.

When the 30-day probation period was up, I went into the boss’s office with my supervisor expecting to be absolved and patted on the back for making such a fine turn around.

Jef, we’ve looked at the door security scanner reports and see that you have in fact made significant improvements in your attendance. The boss said.

Hell yeah I’ve made significant improvements. Twice I even made coffee for the whole damn department. This is the part where they say, good job don’t do it again.

Well, the boss continued, something else has come to our attention and that is your performance.

Huh.

Looking at the server logs, we noticed that you’ve made several changes on the company web server.

A significant part of my job is to maintain that server. I rebuffed.

Well, you didn’t go through Test Company.

Huh.

In fact, none of the changes you made went through any approval processes.

This is the company web, we’ve never...

Didn’t your supervisor tell you repeatedly that you needed to start making your changes in Test Company?

Um, well...

He refuses to play by the rules. My supervisor chimed in.

"I also have an email here from Production Services that says you still haven’t implemented their change request from over a month