10/05/2026
I had a bit of a scare this weekend!
As some of y’all know, I work A LOT. Being a Combat Veteran, work has kind of become a coping mechanism for my PTSD. My logic has always been: if my brain is busy thinking about work, it can’t wander off into those dark places, right?
Well, the days leading up to Sunday, I had been staying up until around 4–5 AM live streaming… while still getting up in the morning to take my boys to school and go to my day job. Sunday morning rolls around and suddenly I realize it’s 6 AM. I try to lay down and sleep, but of course my brain is still going 100 mph. So we figured, “Well, if I’m already awake, why not go to the early church service and get a jump start on the day?” And in my head I’m thinking, “I used to pull all-nighters in the Army. I’ll be fine.” He was NOT fine. 😂
We get to church, Mass starts, and everything feels normal. I’m tired, but nothing crazy. Then as Mass progresses, the exhaustion starts creeping in. I remember thinking, “Okay… maybe Mass wasn’t the best idea. Ya boi is TIRED.” But I figured if I could just make it to Communion, I’d head out to the car afterward and take a power nap.
Well… As soon as we kneel down, it hits me like a freight train. With every ring of the bells, I could feel myself getting weaker. I started getting lightheaded, my vision was fading, and I knew I needed to GET OUT. The problem? We always sit near the front. And this church holds roughly 900 people.
So I stand up and start shimmying past my boys to get out of the pew. As I pass my wife, I whisper, “I need to go to the car.” I didn’t want to worry her. I figured she’d just think, “He’s exhausted. He’s going to go sleep it off.” Which honestly was my plan… at first.
I start walking toward the back of the church, trying my absolute best to hold myself together. But with every step, I can feel my body fading. I can barely keep my eyes open. I’m staring down at my feet, catching little glimpses of them as I walk, basically telling myself: “Just keep moving.”
Somehow, I make it into the lobby area. At this point, I’m sure everyone who saw me probably thought I was some random drunk stumbling out of church. 😂 But in my head I’m thinking: “Just get outside. Sit on the curb. Rest. Pass out if you need to. You’re almost there.”
So I keep walking. By this point, I’m barely coherent and honestly have no idea how I’m still upright. I’m repeating to myself: “Just make it outside.” “Just make it outside.”
Then suddenly… BAM. My forehead smashes into something HARD. And my entire body collapses to the ground like a bag of rice. It literally felt like someone walked over to the breaker box of my body and flipped the switch OFF.
Almost instantly, I could feel people surrounding me asking if I was okay. Turns out the “hard object” I ran into… was the main door leading outside.
People helped me up, got me into a chair, and supported my body because at that point I had gone completely limp. Thankfully, they reacted quickly, called emergency services, and notified my wife and kids, who were still inside the church.
I was taken to the hospital, ran through a few tests, and after a couple of hours I was thankfully given a clean bill of health and discharged. I was just exhausted and dehydrated.
So in closing… Thank you to everyone at church who immediately came to help me. Thank you to the local Fire Department and emergency responders who took care of me. And thank you to God for putting that door in my way.
Because as much as my forehead probably disagrees… if I had actually made it outside, away from everyone, and collapsed somewhere alone… who knows what could have happened.
Sometimes the door you run into might actually be the thing that saves you. 🙏
