First off, I want to apologize to the fine folks at Writers of the Future and the friends in LA we were scheduled to see. I had been really looking forward to the trip and seeing and talking with a lot of old friends, and meeting some new writers. But I am not writing this from LA where I should be at the moment, I’m back at home.
We started on the trip just fine on Monday, made it the eight plus hours of driving to Red Bluff, CA, and stayed there the first night. Coming from the cool Oregon Coast to the hot temperatures of the valley that first afternoon was a shock, but I didn’t think much about it. Then the next morning at 10 in Northern California it was one hundred degrees and I started to remember what real heat was like and the problems I have with it. Even though our car was air conditioned, just going in and out of the heat for packing the car, going to breakfast, coming out, and stopping thirty minutes down the freeway I was having trouble.
By the time we stopped another thirty minutes down the freeway, I was pretty much gone. It was 105 and I have extreme problems with heat. I was drinking fluids, but still getting sick. Kris called a local area doc, got some help, and then after talking with the doctor turned around and got us home, somehow. That part is a blur to me.
Sounds crazy, doesn’t it?
Okay, now a story about how at sixty years of age I have gotten to the place in my life that even brief contract with temperatures above ninety degrees knocks me down.
The First Time: Back when I was a golf pro, I lived in Palm Springs, California. I was the head professional of a nice course there and because in 1974 Palm Springs was beyond boring for a mid-twenties single man, I worked two nights a week at a restaurant called The Cask and Cleaver as a waiter, just for the social life.
One fine June day, the staff and friends of the Cask and Cleaver challenged the staff of El Torito Restaurant to a touch football game. (My girlfriend worked part-time at El Torito when she wasn’t managing the Penny’s Department store. Yeah, Palm Springs for young people in 1974 was deadly dull.)
We started at 7 in the morning and played until 10. Memory serves it was over a hundred degrees by 10 AM, but we were all young and used to it. No issue. I went back to my place, took a shower and then headed for my golf course. When I got there my father called and asked if I wanted to join him for a quick 18 holes of golf. A new (very private) course had opened and was letting local pros on for the day to take a look. (My father was also a golf professional in Palm Springs at the time.) I said sure, made sure my assistant professional had the course covered and headed to play golf. It took four of us until about three to finish and the temperature was close to 120.
Back to my golf course I went and when I arrived I noticed that the kid hadn’t picked up the range balls. Usually in the summer we had the range closed and the balls picked up by eleven in the morning because leaving golf balls sit in 120 degree sun was never a good idea. So with no one else around to do it, I jumped in the makeshift cart with the ball picker and headed down on the range. The cart had no roof.
That was the last thing I remember until I woke up in the hospital with tubes sticking out of me and machines all around me and doctors very happy to see me awake.
Luckily for me both the bar and restaurant of my golf course looked out over the driving range. From what the few members in the restaurant and the bartender said happened, I just drove the cart off into the desert where it got stuck in the sand. They thought it was funny until I fell out of the cart face first into the sand and didn’t move.
Severe Heat Stroke.
That was the first time. It became a funny story of my stupidity like some of my other stories that have the phrase in it “then I almost died.” Over the years, as I got older, I noticed that every so often, after working out in high heat, and not drinking enough fluids, I would get sick or dizzy or have some of the other symptoms.
On one of Kris and my very first trips together, I ended up with another bad case of heat stroke and threw up and lay in a trailer for a day while she had to socialize with my friends that she had never met. On another time Kris and I with a couple of friends flew into the Idaho Primitive Area for a backpacking trip. I had forgotten the lessons again and by the end of the first day of hiking in 100 degree heat with a heavy backpack and not drinking enough fluids, I was down sick. That time I had to be airlifted out of the primitive area. Not kidding.
Three years ago, while in the best shape I had been in for a decade, I went with Kris to run an easy 5-K on the beach. For a change the wind wasn’t blowing off the ocean and it got up to about 75, the hottest day of the year here. I had too many clothes on (expecting it to be cold on the beach like usual) and three hours later the doctors in the hospital had me hooked up to a bunch of different machines because they thought I was having a heart attack. It wasn’t until Kris remembered my heat problem and told them to give me fluids and salt that I came out of that one. (Heat stroke can often imitate a heat attack.)
A number of years back I went to a family wedding held in the courtyard of a hotel on a 115 degree day in Boise, Idaho. Yup, you guessed it, I sat in the sun (Kris wasn’t there to make me stay out of the sun or not go) and I was down yet again.
So, over the years, my body, through repeated episodes of my stupidity, has had heat stroke episode after heat stroke episode, usually with the upshot of me ending up in a hospital. And that repeated stupidity has had the expected result of making me very sensitive to heat above 90, or getting too overheated in work or exercise without extreme fluid intake.
Did I have another heat stroke episode on the way to Writers of the Future? Not quite. What I was in was what the doctors call advanced heat exhaustion, which is the lead-up to another heat stroke episode, and with many of the same symptoms. I was headed for another hospital visit when both Kris and I realized what was happening. (Mostly Kris.) I was already pretty sick and dizzy with heat exhaustion, and that was with only two hours total of exposure to the high heat, plus what I had the day before. And LA on Wednesday was having heat warnings.
For those familiar with heat exhaustion and heat stroke, the older you get, the more you have had it in the past, the more you are open to it. Also I have high blood pressure, controlled, but still a factor. I now have doctor’s orders to just stay out of 90 degree and above heat. As the doctor said yesterday, one of these times it’s just going to kill me. (Yeah, that got my attention.)
What is interesting is that Kris and I planned this trip with some of this in mind. We decided to not fly because of fear that being stuck in a hot, crowded plane on the runway would really hurt me. And we wanted our own car there instead of being driven around as offered because we wanted to be able to leave if I started having troubles with the heat. So we had thought of this problem. I was a little worried about the high heat under the television lights at the ceremony, but figured I would deal with that later.
What we didn’t have figured was how fantastically touchy I am with high heat these days. I spent almost $1,600 to make sure our car’s air conditioning was working well for this trip, (replaced the entire system actually, because here on the coast we never use it and it had gone south) yet I forgot about getting to the car from hotels, restaurants, and so on, usually across hot pavement.
I live on the Oregon Coast for a reason. Winter gets down to around 40, summer days, like today, are around 55-60 degrees.
As of today, Thursday, I am doing slightly better, but even writing this with a cool ocean breeze blowing over me is tiring me out. Time for another nap. Thanks everyone for all the good wishes on Kris’s blog and Twitter. Much appreciated.
So, again I am very sorry to the wonderful people at Writers of the Future for not making the ceremony and to all the great friends we would have had a wonderful time with. We hope to see you sometime in the fall or winter or spring.
I think summers I’m just staying right here.
I’m just glad you’re okay! I’m not good with heat but I don’t have it quite that bad. (Although we’ve learned to avoid the really hot spots on the motorcycle if I’m on the trip.)
Although it would take longer, another thought is to come down the coast–cooler pretty much all the way. And you have the bonus of someone to stay with in Ventura County.
{{{hugs}}} and hope you’re fully back on your feet soon!
Glad you made it home!
Thanks, everyone. Now if some energy would just return I’d almost be back.
Again, thanks for the good wishes. I also am glad Kris was smart enough to get us turned around and out of that heat. Most of it was a blur, but I’m fairly certain I was saying something along the lines of “Oh, I’ll be all right.” (grin) The old professional athlete in me always wants to just push on. Brain twenty, body sixty. Body winning. (grin)
Glad to hear that you’re okay, Dean. Like I told Kris, when I read the first part of her post it scared the crap out of me, but the rest cleared things up.
Looking forward to seeing you guys in October.
Good grief, Dean! I’m glad you’re okay, too! And that you both had the presence of mind to go while the getting was good.
Whoa! I hope you’re on the mend and feeling much better soon, Dean.
And I’m sure the WotF people would rather you stay home and get well, instead of keel over dead upon arrival in L.A. Though I’m just guessing, of course.
As someone who can deal with 10 below, but not 80 above, I feel for you.
Get well soon.
Glad you’re back home doing okay. I know where you’re coming from, to some extent. Once in my 20s, while in the best shape of my life, I went out in 106 degree temps and jogged 8 miles. Passed out in the shower at home and woke up in a hospital.
Now, 20+ years later, my heart’s not what it used to be, so I have to avoid outside heat as much as possible.
Man, what a bummer, but glad you’re doing okay. The last thing any of us want is for one of your crazy stories to end without the word “almost” in it.
Going all the way down 101 would certainly been another way to go, but maybe your plan is better. Just stay put in the summers.
Oh, Dean, I’m so sorry. Poor thing. This just sounds awful. I’m so glad you turned around and came home.
Dean,
So glad you’re home and on the mend. Hopefully the energy will come back faster than you think. It’s been in the 100s here, too, but we had a cold front come through today that has had me pretty cool. Take it easy, both of you. It’s beautiful where you are.
I gotta ask: Are you like me when it comes to injuries or surgery? I usually keep thinking, “as long as my mind and fingers are okay, I can keep writing.”
At least that’s what I kept thinking four months ago when I had an internal defibrillator implanted in my chest (that, and all the story ideas that occurred to me about internal defibrillators, mostly horror).
Glad you’re doing better Dean. I’m sorry you guys couldn’t make it to LA like you wanted, but it sounds like you had better just stay away from the heat. Take it easy.
Sorry to hear about that Dean. Hope you feel better. And, since I haven’t thanked you before, thanks for all the good information and the kick in the pants. I have been reticent, maybe even afraid, about a lot of things when it comes to writing and submitting. But I’m glad to say you have kicked them out of me. Thanks for that.
Get better.
Thanks again, everyone for the well wishes. Very much appreciated. I am almost back to feeling normal. Another day of rest and I’ll be as annoying as ever. Thanks!
Wow, Dean, I’m sorry that happened to you. I hope you’re continuing to feel better and that the cool air does you good.
That was quite a heat wave. I am Delaware this week, where I had feared it would be outrageously hot and humid, but a cool front came in, while meanwhile, my San Francisco home, which never gets very hot and has had the coldest summer in over 30 years, was in the upper 90s. I’ve heard reports that the marine layer has finally rolled back in, cooling things down.
Glad you did not get stuck in LA in that heatwave, but sorry your body started to shut down.
Be well, Dean.
Glad you’re on the mend. I live in the southeast, and even with a sedentary job and universal air conditioning, it’s still like the Bataan Death March getting through the summer. This year it’s been particularly brutal. We are finally having a break in the heat & humidity. You know it’s been bad when you go outside and it’s in the upper 80s/low 90s and you think, “Oh, gosh, it’s nice out today!”
Get plenty of rest & keep getting better!
I had always heard that heat stroke was really nasty, but I didn’t know HOW nasty. Maybe WotF would be willing to move to Alaska for you.
What a relief (to read that you survived)! Maybe it is time to avoid all risk of heat exhaustion with no compromises and no exceptions. At this point in your life you have to put the highest priority on your health.
Mary Jo, that’s the attitude Kris and I have no adopted for me. Just too old to take the chances anymore. And too sensitive it seems.
Kris reminded me of yet another really bad heat stroke episode I have talked about. Same summer as the first one. My date was wrong in the column, I said August, but now that I am more alert, I remember it was June. I left Palm Springs that summer in early July, after not being able to handle the heat much after that first episode in the hospital. But what do I do? Get in an open-air 1948 Willy’s Jeep with no roof and head across the Majove. Got to Bishop extremely sunburned and heat stoked yet again and ended up laying in the back room of a garage until midnight when it was cool enough for me to go again. Seems right from the start I was too stupid for words when it came to heat. Sigh, now here it is 35 years later and many more lessons and still screwing up. Some things are just hard to learn for me. (duh)
Ouch. Glad to hear you’re okay. I had a near run-in with that once in Las Vegas, not pleasant at all. Next time you venture away from the coast maybe you should get one of those liquid cooling garments like the astronauts wear under their spacesuits.
Good thing you know about the salt problem. Since I’m not terribly heat tolerant and I have to do extended desert surveys occasionally (occupational hazard), here’s some suggestions.
–back when I was a kid, my mom taught me a simplified version of the standard oral rehydration formula: water as salty as tears, or approximately 1/4 teaspoon of salt per 12 ounces of water. As you’ve found out, if you’re not heat adapted, you tend to lose a lot of salt through your sweat, and getting rehydrated makes the salt deficiency worse (it’s concentration, not amount). This is known as hyponatremia, and getting rehydrated when you’re hyponatremic is a nuisance.
So, if you’re thinking you’re going to get hot, take a small container of table salt with you. It’s amazingly hard to get when you need it.
If you’re still feeling wiped out, you might want to try it now. If you’re still running low on salt, this mix will taste amazing. If you’re okay, then it will be a struggle to drink it.
You can also buy gatorade, or add a few tablespoons of apple juice and a half lime for a reasonable facsimile. But the key part is that it has to be as salty as tears.
– Figure out what the early stage of heat exhaustion feels like for you, so you can catch yourself early next time.
–Take a black umbrella with you. It’s called a parasol. If you walk in the shade of the umbrella, it takes all the heat that you would have, and you stay cool. This is better than a hat, because the membrane of the parasol is well away from your body. It can get hot to the touch, but you’re not touching it. In the desert, this has saved me two liters over the course of a day, which is a nice weight savings.
–If you need to dump heat in a hurry, use the trick that the military and NFL use: dump it out your hands by getting them as cold as possible. You can do this by buying a block of ice, sticking your hands in the fridge of a gas station or grocery store, whatever. You lose and gain heat through your hands and feet faster than any other way (this is the NFL trick, why they have those weird gloves on on the sidelines). Grabbing something like cold metal is good, because metal conducts heat really well. Ice inside a plastic bag is less good, because plastic insulates, so the heat flow will be slow. Touch the ice directly. It will melt fast, so make sure you have somewhere for the water to go.
On one bad area, where I had to take volunteers out and we got heat stressed routinely, afterward I would take the volunteer into a walk-in fridge and grab the metal rack by the veggies (36 degrees). Five or ten minutes later, we had gone from severely heat exhausted to fine. I loved that particularly grocery store, and always made sure to buy something to repay all their cold that I had taken.
Hope this helps.
Great advice for everyone, heteromeles, thanks! Actually might use that advice for characters in stories as well. Great stuff.
Doing better finally today (Friday). Came way too close to another heat stroke it seems. Thanks again for the great advice. I was drinking Gatorade as fast as Kris could get it down me and I could keep it down. It helps as well, I agree.
Hey folks, we found our “Global Warming Canary!” Everyone watch Dean and this space for GWC updates! RSS feeds coming as soon as we get him wired with live feed of internal and surface temperatures, pulse rate, and verbal coherency.
…Sorry, couldn’t resist. So glad you dodged the hammer blow this time. Now if you can just learn to dodge those bullets.
I forgot about the story of that Idaho trip. Glad you’re on the mend , Dean.
Now that I’ve been through two Arizona summers and working in it, yeah, the heat can can be hard on the body.
First of all I’m glad you’re okay. I just read your post last night and whoa. Heat is nothing to play around with as you know.
But at the same time boy was that bad timing. I don’t know about Northern Ca but here in Central Ca we have been having a very mild summer. So far only three days maybe four of over 100 degree days. It’s been a cool sixty in the mornings and 93 to 96 at the hottest. Usually we don’t get quite as hot as your old stumping grounds but it’s close. The last three days have been 105 to 111. Tomorrow it’s supposed to be a chilly seventy, maybe eighty depending on which forecast is right. So that means you hit Ca at the worst time.
I would imagine the coastal highway would have been a lot cooler, if you could have made it that far. But it’s a good thing you didn’t try.
I’m sure she didn’t do it for us, but thank Kris for us, for reacting correctly.
That’s too bad, Dean. Glad you’re feeling better.
Dean, like I said on Kris’s blog, heat stroke kills trainees in Basic Training every year. Definitely not anything to play around with. I am so glad you and she know the danger signs, and turned around. It’s a drag not having you here, but I am so glad you didn’t push it and land yourself at death’s door.
Glad to hear you are okay. I’m glad Kris was able to remember the signs and get you to help. Heat reactions are nothing to play around with. I also have a problem with heat, and I’m in the wrong environment for it (Arizona). I go from one cool place to the next cool place as fast as possible. Someday I need to get back to someplace cooler. The Oregon coast and ocean breezes sound wonderful right now.
Yikes! Glad you’re OK! Take care, please.
You know, a man your age just has to be careful all the time. The sins of your misspent youth coming back to get you and all.
Take care, old guy.
Boy, got that right, Steve. But the key is that in my youth I had to be repeatedly stupid. That helps get a person to this spot. (grin)
Have I said how much I love the cool weather of the Oregon Coast? Thanks again, everyone for the well wishes. Doing much better.
Glad to hear you’re getting better.
I had my first bout with heat exhaustion last summer. I moved from nice, cool Oregon to humid, hot Arkansas. I, my fiancé and mother-in-law to be decided to clean out the garage in the middle of the day, which turned out to be not such a great idea. I nearly passed out, but luckily got back into the air-conditioning and got some fluids down before anything really bad happened. It was embarrassing at the time, and now I realize I should have been paying closer attention to my body. It knows what’s good for me.
It must have been a hard drive back. A sickness feels exponentially worse the farther you are from home.
Stay out of the heat and enjoy the coast!