That Time Google Saved My Life

We've all done it: You come down with some common ailment, Google the symptoms, and are shocked to discover that you could have cancer or some other terrible problem. So the advice is simple: Don't self-diagnose. But here's the thing: One time, I did do so, and Google saved my life.

Seriously.

In late February 2005, I traveled to Breckenridge, Colorado with my friend Chris for a long weekend of skiing. I've been visiting Colorado's ski country since the early 1980's---my dad has owned a place near Durango's Purgatory ski area for over 30 years---so I have decades of experience at altitude.

I wasn't sick when I left for Colorado, but when I arrived in Breckenridge, I started getting pounding headaches and was always exhausted. No worries, I thought: That's what happens sometimes when you adjust to high altitude. I'll just drink lots of liquids and suck it up. No need to ruin the weekend.

And so we skied. I took a couple of pictures from the top of the mountain, tried to deal with my pounding headache, my aching body, and my difficulty breathing. And then I eventually gave up: On the second day, I told Chris I needed to stay in the room, and he headed off to the mountain, confused. I crashed.

That night we headed out for dinner, but I felt even worse. I have a strange memory of walking down the street, trailing Chris, and trying to listen to what he was saying but not understanding him, of not hearing him and then hearing him again. By the time I went to bed, I had a raging fever. I put a cold, wet facecloth on my forehead and went to bed, thinking that if I just made it through the night, I'd be fine. We could just fly home, and I'd be away from the altitude.

When I woke up, the facecloth was both dry and hot, and I figured it was early morning. Nope: It was just an hour or two later, it was the middle of the night, and I was not OK. So I crawled out of bed, grabbed my laptop, and laid down on the bathroom floor in the dark. And I started Googling.

What I saw wasn't good. My basic symptoms---fatigue, breathlessness, headache, fever---indicated basic altitude sickness. This happens all the time, and is common. But I was worse than that: I had sort of blacked out walking to dinner, had experienced confusion at Chris' words.

I seemed to be suffering from one of two things. High-altitude pulmonary edema (HAPE), from which I could recover if I acted on it quickly enough. Or High-altitude cerebral edema (HACE), which was even worse.

So I called the front desk at the hotel an inquired about an in-house doctor. Nope. I was told to call the local hospital, called the Breckenridge Medical Center. I will never forget that conversation.

I described my symptoms and was told I needed to come in immediately. Do not wait for the morning, I was told. Can someone drive me there? Yes. No, seriously, I was told: Do not drive yourself. Is there someone else who can drive you? If not, they would send an ambulance. Yes, I rep...

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