Drew Magary was in the hospital after he was able to feed himself again. He lost 30 pounds in 2 weeks.
Drew Magary only had a beer and a few drinks before collapsing.
He had a life-threatening brain bleed, but the clinicians almost dismissed him as drunk.
Magary wrote about how he learned to live with a traumatic brain injury.
Drew Magary was a big fan of drinking. The Deadspin journalist would usually host with a few cocktails because he could, and his wife's go-to Christmas present was a bottle of nice booze.
In December of last year, the Maryland-based father of three abstained from alcohol before delivering a monologue for his magazine's tongue-in-cheek awards ceremony.
His friends knew something was wrong when he collapsed, began bleeding profusely, and mumbled nonsense early into the afterparty. His friends told him that clinicians brushed it off as drunkenness and nearly discharged him with brain bleeding.
The Night the Lights Went Out is a new book by Magary, who is still dealing with the long-term effects of traumatic brain injury. He is not the only young person with a life threatening illness who is dismissed by medical professionals because of their intoxication.
Magary's colleagues fought to get him an magnetic resonance image that likely saved his life.
Magary woke up from a medically-induced coma two weeks later after attending a karaoke bar afterparty. He interviewed his colleagues who witnessed it.
One of the people said he felt a thump and saw Magary on his back with his hands in his chest and blood behind his head.
Another colleague called for help. Chitanvis said that the EMTs seemed to think that you were drunk. He said they tried to make Magary walk rather than put him in a stretcher.
The doctors tried to send Magary home in the emergency room. Megan Greenwell, then editor-in-chief of Deadspin, told Magary that the doctors and nurses were being so blasé about it that she started to doubt herself.
She insisted on an exam. Blood was coming from cracks in Magary's skull. He had a brain hemorrhage that was on the verge of killing him.
His blood alcohol level was less than one beer.
He was in a coma for 2 weeks.
Magary was intubated and sent to a New York hospital that was better equipped to deal with brain trauma. He underwent an emergency surgery in which holes were drilled into his skull to stop the bleeding.
If Magary isn't in surgery within four hours, they have no chance of living. After his collapse, Magary's surgery took over six hours.
Magary's life has changed forever. He lost his hearing in one ear, his sense of smell and taste, and thousands of dollars. At one point, his kids began to fear him because he was so cranky.
Magary wrote that he became frustrated when he tried to be Other Drew. I had to give up. I had to understand that my injury had changed me and everyone I loved.
Drew Magary today.
Other young people have been dismissed.
Magary's book focuses on his experiences learning to live with disability, not his interactions with healthcare professionals who his friends say blew him off.
Insider previously reported that Brittany Scheier woke up in the middle of the night with extreme nausea after celebrating her 27th birthday. She couldn't stand up, reach for things or move the right side of her body. She narrowed her vision to a pinprick.
In the emergency room, doctors kept asking if you had drugs. If you did, it's okay, said Scheier. She was almost sent home. Doctors didn't know if she would survive after she had suffered two strokes. Scheier wants young women to speak up and know the signs of stroke.
"So many times I hear, 'I was listening to the doctor.' "Maybe they're right,'" Dr. Suzanne Steinbaum told Insider about Scheier's story. No one knows our bodies as well as we do. Nobody is living in our bodies. We know when we're not doing well.
The original article is on Insider.
