John Skripek – Saving My Life

 

Friends are those people that you call when the going doesn’t just get tough … it collapses.

I find it interesting that when something that is beyond our control begins, our subconscious is much smarter than our rational mind.
And in a crisis, we no longer have a handle on our own rational mind.
The intuitive mind and the voices of our angels and guides point us in the right direction and we listen without question because we know that we are in danger.

Such was the case …
In the death of winter …
In beginning of 1982.

I woke up out of a sound sleep and I knew that I was dying!
And I mean really dying!

I did not know why I was dying but everything in my body was on high alert, and I knew I had a fever.

A very high fever!
A fever that I had never felt before in this life.
A fever so high that I was shaking, and trembling like a leaf.

Somehow, I knew that I was on borrowed time. While I cannot say that I heard the voices of angels guiding me. Some massive force inside, knew that I was close to being unconscious or delirious … and that I needed help and to call John Skripek.

Now, in an earlier chapter, I told you that he lived quite a distance from me. And that the U-Bahn in Berlin, closed at night till the early morning hours.

On a logical, rational level, I should have called someone closer from the ballet company.
They could have gotten to me sooner.

But the only person that came into my mind was John!

I picked up the phone and I called him.
A sleepy voice picked up the phone and said, “Hello?”

All I remember saying was, “John, I am dying! I don’t know what is wrong with me by I need you to come to my house right away. I think I am about to pass out and I am very sick. Please come quickly!”

Instantly I heard him, sit up sharply in the bed … because it creaked and he said, “Suzanne are you serious?”

And I said, “Yes, I think I have a really high fever. I can’t stop shaking and I think I am about to faint!”

In a strong masculine voice (not his cute gay voice) he said, “Suzanne, listen to me carefully! I need you … right now … to go to the front door of your apartment and open the door. Put something in front of the door to keep it open. Then go to the front door of the building and open it also and put a shoe in front of the door so I can get into the building. Can you do that right now?”

I softly said, “I think so. I am going to do it now. Hurry!”

Honestly, I don’t remember anything after that moment.
But later on (from John’s account), I did do what he said.

He found me lying across the open door to the front of the building unconscious and delirious. I had passed out and my body was keeping the door open. I had opened my front door of my apartment and had put one of my house shoes in the way so the door would not close.
He picked me up and carried me into the apartment.

I remember none of this.

He took my temperature (he brought a thermometer) and my temperature was 104 degrees!

He said later, no wonder I was delirious.

He tried cold compresses. That was not working.

He said I kept repeating strange things such as: “My eyes hurt! My toenails hurt! My nose hurts! My skin hurts! My teeth hurt! My eyelashes hurt!”

He said I would say one thing and then pass out again from the temperature and the delirium.
He called a friend of his that was a doctor in the middle of the night.

Now I have to say here, that in Germany at that time, doctors did not make house calls.
But on that night because John was his friend, he came over at 2 am to see what he could do to help and to evaluate me to see what was wrong.

While he was going to be driving to get here, he told John to take off my clothes and put me in a cool bathtub of water. Which he evidently did but my temperature continued to rage.

By the time the doctor was there, my temperature had barely dropped one degree from being in a cool tub of water.
They both picked me up and carried me back into the bed.

At that point I have a faint memory.
All I remember was this strange person, shaking me hard and yelling in a firm German voice, “Are you allergic to Novocain?”
I could hear him, but I could not seem to be able to respond to him. I felt like I was the water around a floating cotton ball. (Which was the doctor trying to get my attention).
It was explained to me later that certain types of anesthesia’s lower core body temperature and will stop severe shivering.

But if I had been allergic to it, it could have killed me.

This doctor took the risk and gave me not one but two shots.

I don’t remember either of them. But I had one hell of a bruise on both cheeks the next day.
After the shots I remember slowing coming back into this reality. Everything felt fuzzy. It was as if I was looking at the world through foggy lenses.
I see John looking at me … worried sick! And the Doctor staring at me sternly and asking me, “What drugs are you on?”

I said that it was in the medicine cabinet in my bathroom.

The doctor goes out to get them and he comes back with a bottle of antibiotics that I had been given for pneumonia. I had gotten pneumonia three times that winter, and after all … “The show must go on!” Gudrun Leben’s (the Ballet Mistress of the Berlin Ballet) sister was a doctor and without seeing me, she had prescribed them three times for me to take so I could perform.

The Doctor (friend of John Skripek) holds up the bottle and says, “This? This is what you have been taking?”

I nodded.

Next, he asked, “How long have you been taking them?”
I said, “Three months.”

He stood there in shock with his mouth open!

He said, these were the strongest broad-spectrum antibiotics, and they are not to be taken like that.

He explained that my entire immune system had collapsed and that now, they could not give me this type of medication. My immune system would have to rebuild itself slowly.

He said that I would have to go to the hospital, which is when I started crying.

I was still in a bit of delirium, and I ridiculously said sobbing, “I can’t do that because if my parents found out they would demand to take me home.”

He insisted that I had to go, and that the staff would have to make sure that everything else was working and that I needed fluids, as I was terribly dehydrated.
Then I don’t remember anything else …. for about a week.

I know that sounds strange, but that is all that is in my brain.

What I appreciate about the German medical system is that I never got a bill, I never had to worry about how I was supposed to pay that bill. Everything was handled.
I don’t remember leaving my apartment.
I don’t remember the hospital.
I don’t remember leaving the hospital.
I don’t remember how I ended up at Chissy Steger’s house on the 3^rd floor.
One entire week is completely gone from my memory.
In truth, I only vaguely remember the next 3 weeks. In fact, I am not sure how long I was out of it, I assumed about three weeks, but it might have been more.

The first memory I had was waking up slowly and feeling very groggy.
I was on an unfamiliar bed in a small room that was also clearly an office.
As I sat up, a parrot on a stand, in the corner … by the window said, “Grüße von Gott!” (Meaning “Greetings from God!). It was a type of Good Morning in German.

Startled, I see this green, blue, and a bit of yellow parrot looking down at me.

I was still disoriented and not knowing where I was exactly.

As I stirred, the door opened and there stood, Chissy Steger, the costumer and wig maker from the Berlin Ballet.
She smiled and said, “Guten Morgen Schlafmütze” or “Good Morning sleepyhead!”
Somehow, I was at her house, and she was taking care of me.

What an angel!
I was still really discombobulated and disoriented and much that unfolded after that … is also gone from my memory.

All I remember, is the bird every morning saying, its Good Morning. And the bird also singing a children’s song about a little duck.

“Alle meine Entchen schwimmen auf dem See,

schwimmen auf dem See,

Köpfchen in das Wasser,

Schwänzchen in die Höh.”

Translated it means, “All my ducklings are swimming on the lake,

Swimming on the lake,

Their little heads dip into the water,

Their little tails stick out.”

I remember so little about those weeks.
I don’t remember eating until a moment when I really truly thought I felt good.

But I was about to discover that I was not as strong as I thought.

Chissy was gone and for the first time, I wanted something specific. I wanted some bread with Nutella, and some sodas.

I knew that the store was just at the end of the block. I decided I was going to surprise Chissy with having gone out of the apartment, and getting some groceries.

I managed to get down the three flights of stairs, no problem.

I got to the store, did the shopping, and then got back to her building.

From there … all I remember was getting part of the way up the stairs with the bags of groceries, and then … blacking out.

She found me an hour later, on the 2^nd landing crying. I could not get the rest of the way up the stairs. I was exhausted. I was so weak. I felt like a truck had hit me.

Somehow, she got the neighbors to help me the rest of the way up to the apartment, with two strong men, half carrying me.

Once I calmed down, I decided to look into the mirror at myself.

To my shock I looked like a starving wraith. I had lost a significant amount of weight and I was thinner than I was when I was 15 years old.

Looking in the mirror, I realized how weak I was and how sick I looked.

The mind plays tricks on us to keep us going. It plays games of illusion in an attempt to help us survive.

Even after that moment, most things are still a blur. I remember, going back to the studio for class, weeks later, and seeing myself in a full-length mirror and again being shocked.
I was clearly very weak still and I was not “all there” in my body … or my head.

Very slowly I gained strength back.
It would be years before I felt like myself again.

It took at least 4 years to rebuild my immune system alone.

In that moment, I learned who I could count on in life and death situations, John Skripek and Chissy Steger.
Oh, and the parrot!

I will be eternally grateful to all of them for taking care of me when I could not take care of myself.
As I age, I see the huge gift that they were at a critical time in my life.

Such souls will always be spiritual family to me, and I know that I owe them a karmic debt that I willingly acknowledge in this lifetime.

I will be grateful to give that back to them at another time and place.
To Chissy on the other side, I thank your generous heart that reached out and took my hand and guided me through that terrible 3 plus weeks.

To John, it seems that moment was the beginning of the doors opening for him to go into the healing fields and become the amazing person he is today.
I know his generosity is still a gift in this world to so many.

It was so wonderful to see him at the Berlin Reunion so many years ago now. His smile still brightens a room … though his soul has become so much more serious … over time.
It was good to make him come back to that dancer self as we (Jennifer Stanfield and Marina Hotchkiss) reminded him of our amazing journey together and shared stories.
In our presence his German Doctor façade cracked, and a bit of the silly John came back out into the light.
We knew that funny dancer was still there … and I hope that after our visit, he continued to be a more integrated part self in his amazing life.

~Suzanne Wagner~