In my open palm lay two rings hastily bound together by surgical tape. The exposed gold reflected the overhead flourescent lights in the stained acoustic ceiling tiles of the small, grimy waiting room where I stood, along with two doctors, a nurse, and my sobbing 10-year old daughter. I had just been told that my wife was going to die from a hemorrhagic stroke that caused her collapse an hour before on a London train platform.

She didn’t die that night, despite the dire prognosis.  She lived, and slowly fought her way out of a 2-month long coma, returning home to New York after almost 4 months in a London Hospital. This is the story of that cold, dark London winter, made brighter by friends and strangers, and our journey back to where we all are now – recovering from my wife’s stroke.

Go to Chapter One