107 – Staying Alive, Part 7: 29 November 2024

I have already recounted the increasingly strong sneeze attacks I began experiencing as 2019 wore on.  Although I felt most vulnerable when the sneeze attacks occurred while I was walking at Morialta, they occurred everywhere and not just when I was at Morialta.

Increasingly as 2019 wore on, the sneeze attacks began undermining my stitch line from the open heart surgery.  The constant sneezing began to tear one side of the stich line away from the other side.

I assumed that the sneezing was caused by the stress of what I had been through and that the sneezing would settle down as time went by,

By 2019, I usually walked my Morialta perimeter circuit on my own.  Ill health among my friends meant that they were no longer able to engage in a walk that was as strenuous as the one I was doing.  As well as walking the circuit on my own, it was usually dark for the first 30 minutes or so that I walked.  For most of the perimeter circuit, there is no phone coverage and few other walkers have the stamina or interest to walk the trails that I prefer to walk on as I thread my way through Morialta.

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The initial part of the walk is very steep indeed.  It takes you to Old Norton Summit Road.  Then you walk along Old Norton Summit Road for about ten minutes and re-enter the Park on a track which takes you across the top of Third Falls.  The track in this part of the park is called Third Falls Track and it goes steeply uphill.



I took this photo of Third Falls Track on a very foggy Sunday on 17 July 2022 as I struggled my way up the steep slope of Third Falls Track. 

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I no longer remember the exact spot where the sneeze attack started.  Nor do I now remember the exact date when this particular sneeze attack occurred, but the location for the start of the attack was close to the location shown in this photo.

I was walking alone and I had left Third Falls behind me.  The date was after Ann Ryan returned to Ireland on 17 May 2019 and it was before Margaret and I flew to Ireland to join Ann on Friday 7 September 2019.  My guess is that this particular sneeze attack occurred on a bitter cold Sunday morning in June 2019.

Although I had left Third Falls behind me, at least another 45 minutes of very hard uphill walking lay in front of me.  Once I finished this final, extremely hard uphill stretch, the walking would all be relatively easy – either walking on the flat or walking downhill.

The sneeze attack that started after I had left Third Falls behind me very nearly stopped me from ever getting up that final, ever so hard uphill stretch.  It nearly left me dead.

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The attack started in the usual way – 15 sneezes followed by a lull in the sneezing when I started to blow my nose to clear out the grunge conjured up in my nasal system by the sneezing. 

I barely finished blowing my nose before another series of 15 sneezes began trying to disintegrate my stitch line.  Then there was another … and another … and another … and the sneezing simply refused to ever stop.

I staggered my way as best I could up the hill, sneezing violently as I lurched.

I threw away my sodden handkerchief.  It rapidly became useless.  I desperately needed to keep clearing my nose but it was useless trying to use a handkerchief to do so.  I simply blew the endless mucus straight onto the ground.

I had no respite.  I sneezed non stop and I blew my nose onto the ground non stop.  After about thirty minutes - or was it perhaps forty five minutes – I knew I was in big trouble.  I was literally miles away from anyone else.  There was no help anywhere near me.  It was such a miserable winter day that no one except me had even dreamed of walking in the park.  If I stopped and rested on the ground, U would die either from the cold or from a chest torn apart by the sneezing.  If I wanted to get out of the Park alive, I would have to walk out.

Behind me, the track went mostly downhill, but there had been no maintenance on the track for at least 20 years and the track was studded with dangerous rocks that poked out of the ground.  If I stumbled on a rock, I would fall and probably hit my head on another rock.  The walking would be relatively easy if I went downhill, but death would also be very easy if I went downhill.

If I went uphill, the walking would be harder, but it would be safer.  If I had the strength to get up the hill, I had a much better chance of living than if I turned back downhill.

I very slowly stumbled my way up the Third Falls track, frightening all of the park wildlife as I went, my continuous, violent sneezing echoing its way across the Park.

I think it took me an hour and a half to stagger my way up to the top of Third Falls Track.


I also took this photo of Third Falls Track on Sunday 17 July 2022.

When I finally got to the top of Third Fals Track, I grabbed a gate post for support, not daring to let go.  I now knew I would be able to get back to my friends for coffee.  The journey from here to the bottom of the Park was extremely long and hard, but it was easy compared to what I had just endured.

I arrived at the bottom of the Park one hour late for coffee with my friends, A walk which normally took me three hours forty five minutes had taken me five hours.  I knew I had survived only because I had refused to give in.  By the time I sat down for coffee, the sneeze attack finally stopped.

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The continuation of my life that Sunday had hung very precariously in the balance for the three long hours after the start of the sneeze attack. 

Luckily, I got out alive.

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