Reader's Digest

ŚıIJ÷ƎIJ÷Ş÷ƘƋƙ ƶƘƣƳƋƧīīƋƋ żìƥ ōƖÜŊ÷ ƒƘōƒƭƇĺ÷ƤƏƸƍIJƩƛƛIJƍìƬƍơ͟Ʃ Ɣ͟Ś ĖƧƔ Ƨ͟
ıĖƔƋƲơī͡

The Better Magnesium. CELEBRA TING 15 YEARS OF CHANGING LIVES
• ESTABLISHED 2005 •
BETTER-ABSORBING, BETTER-TASTING, BEST LOVED.

RI SURâWV GRQDWHG WR KHOS HQG SRYHUW\

naturalcalm.ca /LQGD %ROWRQ

Founder & CEO

Natural Calm Canada





































































(MASK) ISTOCK.COM/CQYOUNG Best Safety BEST PERSONAL DELIVERY
Insurance
Joanne Turner has worked as a cus-
In late March, a tomer service representative at her
young man local Real Canadian Superstore in
walked into Joe Kelowna, B.C., for 23 years. But nothing could
Zhou and Melissa Gu’s have prepared the 56-year-old for how busy
Saskatoon grocery store, her store would get in March. During one of
Ferr’s Asia Foody, and her shifts that month, she received a panicked
handed 20 disposable call from a woman 4,000 km away in Ottawa.
face masks to a cashier. The woman’s elderly mother needed groceries,
A regular customer, he but health conditions prevented her mom from
had noticed that making the trek. The woman was scrambling to
employees didn’t have find a store that delivered that day, but an over-
any and wanted them to loaded system meant wait times stretched into
have protection. weeks. “I could tell by her voice that she was
Inspired by the stran- anxious,” says Turner. She offered to make the
ger’s kindness, Zhou and delivery herself, and received a tearful thanks.
Gu, who are a married Turner has since volunteered to make sev-
couple, decided to pay it eral delivery trips for the family—in between
forward. They connected working two jobs (the other at Dollarama) and
with a friend in China caring for herself and her husband. When an
who works at a pharmacy. item that her store doesn’t stock made it to the
With his help, they list—carrot muffins—Turner even stopped at
secured 5,000 disposable another store. She says she’s happy to help,
surgical masks to donate crediting her motherly instincts—she adds,
to their city’s front-line laughing, that she packed lunches for her old-
workers, who, like others est son until he was 24. “If everyone just took
around the country, were on one senior to help right now,” she says, “it
facing a shortage of per- would make a big difference.”
sonal protective equip-
ment. “We hope that rd.ca 35
helps to keep people
working on the front lines
just a bit safer,” Gu says.

reader’s digest

DRAMA IN REAL LIFE

THE BOY WITH

A SPIKE
IN

HEADHIS

Xavier Cunningham fell onto a rotisserie
skewer and impaled his face. Doctors
couldn’t believe he was still alive.

BY Bonnie Munday

rd.ca 37

reader’s digest

X avier Cunningham was of a knuckle on his left hand. As he (PREVIOUS SPREAD) STEVE PUPPE
having fun that warm swatted at it with his right, he lost his
Saturday afternoon in Sep- balance and fell, face down. Just
tember 2018 with his bud- before breaking his fall with his arms,
dies Silas and Gavon. he felt a sting just under his left eye.
Xavier, a bubbly, energetic 10-year-old, Was that a wasp? he thought. Then he
enjoyed playing in the yard behind his realized he’d landed on the metal
house in Harrisonville, Missouri. skewer. Nearly half of it was buried in
his head. Screaming, he got up and
That day, the trio was chucking ran toward home.
around a stainless-steel skewer, throw-
ing it into the ground like a spear. At 43 Gabrielle Miller, Xavier’s 39-year-old
centimetres long and more than half mom, was upstairs folding laundry in the
a centimetre thick, the square-edged two-storey brick home she shared with
skewer was used to rotisserie meat; one her husband, Shannon, a high school
end had four sharp prongs attached. teacher, and their four children. Shan-
non had taken two of their kids on a day
Eventually, they ditched the skewer trip to nearby Peculiar, while Gabrielle,
near a neighbour’s tree house, sticking who manages a local title-insurance
it in the ground with the four prongs business, stayed at home with Xavier
anchoring it. With the neighbour’s per- and his 14-year-old sister, Chayah. She
mission, they climbed the three-metre heard her son screaming and sighed.
ladder. Up top, a few yellow-jacket wasps When will he grow out of this stuff?
buzzed around. “If we don’t bother
them, they won’t bother us,” said Xavier. Xavier usually made a fuss over the
smallest scratch. If one of their two dogs
But the boys hadn’t seen the large jumped up on him, he’d start scream-
wasp nest wrapped around part of the ing; he was too scared to walk Max, the
tree house. Soon the insects were com- coonhound he’d gotten as a puppy,
ing at the panicked boys thick and because the dog pulled on the leash.
fast, in a dense black cloud. “I’ll get my His overreactions were pretty much a
mom!” Xavier yelled, but now he stared, daily occurrence.
frightened, at the tree-house ladder,
which was covered in a seething mass Gabrielle was almost down the stairs,
of angry wasps. This is going to hurt, he Chayah right behind her, when Xavier
thought. His hands crunched on the pushed the front door open, shrieking,
insects and the stings were painful as “Mom, Mom!” Gabrielle was trying to
he grasped each rung, going as care- make sense of what she was seeing.
fully and quickly as he could. “Get them off!” Xavier was yelling, bat-
ting at wasps. She pulled wasps off him,
When he was about halfway down, getting stung herself.
a wasp painfully stung the thin skin

38 september 2020

Gabrielle was confused and shocked. collar around his neck and wrapped
“Who shot you?!” It looked like there his entire head in white gauze to help
was an arrow through her son’s face; a stabilize the skewer. The only thing
single trickle of blood ran down from left exposed besides it and its four
it. With his stung, swollen hands, he sharp prongs—caked with mud from
touched the tip of the skewer on the where they’d been stuck in the ground—
back of his neck, a lump that hadn’t was his mouth.
pierced the skin.
Dr. Jeong Hyun, the pediatric sur-
Gabrielle guided Xavier out the front geon working the emergency room at
door and into the front of her Camaro. Children’s Mercy that afternoon,
She then ran to the driver’s side. A couldn’t believe his eyes when Xavier
shocked neighbour, watching as the was rolled in at about 4 p.m. He asked
car backed out into the road, thought, Xavier to wiggle his toes and fingers.
That boy’s not coming home. He was relieved that Xavier was so
responsive; it meant that neither his
XAVIER THOUGHT A spine nor brain had likely been hit.
WASP HAD STUNG HIM.
The skewer also hadn’t punctured
THEN HE REALIZED any of Xavier’s vital blood vessels. If an
HE’D FALLEN ON THE artery such as the carotid or the verte-
bral, which carry blood to the brain,
METAL SKEWER. had been hit and was leaking out inter-
nally, it could cause a stroke. Dr. Hyun
gabrielle rushed into the Cass Regional was amazed to see via a CT angiogram
Medical Center emergency room with that nothing was leaking and the skewer
a remarkably calm Xavier walking had narrowly missed every vital artery.
alongside her, the huge spike sticking They looked to be millimetres, if that,
more than 20 centimetres out of his away. That’s spectacular, thought Dr.
face. The skewer didn’t appear to have Hyun. But now what?
hit his spine, but an X-ray can’t show
tissue damage. ER staff realized they’d If the skewer had any kind of bend, a
have to send him somewhere with more sharp edge or a gap, then pulling it out
advanced imaging equipment: Chil- would be rolling the dice, as it could
dren’s Mercy Hospital in downtown catch on an artery and rip it open. But
Kansas City, 40 minutes north. the only way to get a clear picture of the
skewer was with biplane angiogra-
To prevent Xavier from moving his phy—a piece of equipment that gives
head, staff fitted a plastic cervical doctors a three-dimensional view inside
the vascular system. Children’s Mercy
did not have it, since vascular problems

rd.ca 39

reader’s digest

are so rare in kids. But the University of against the boy. How can someone
Kansas Medical Center, less than five live through an impalement like that?
kilometres away, did. Xavier would need he thought.
to be transported to a third hospital.
Yet he was alive—which told Dr.
It was now 7:30 p.m. Xavier had been Kakarala they had a chance of remov-
impaled for six hours. ing it. But how? If they hit any key
blood vessels, Xavier could experience
dr. koji ebersole, an endovascular neu- a debilitating stroke, or he could die.
rosurgeon at the University of Kansas
Medical Center, stared at a photo of For the next couple of hours, Drs.
Xavier on a gurney. He had also never Ebersole and Kakarala consulted with
seen anything like the boy’s injury. How various specialists. They knew they
deep is that thing? he wondered. And needed to see exactly what the skewer
how is this kid even alive? had damaged, or still could damage,
and then remove it while carefully
THE DOCTOR HAD monitoring its exit. Using the angiog-
NEVER SEEN ANYTHING raphy suite required a team of 15 to 20
LIKE XAVIER’S INJURY. medical staff. It would be tough to get
the right people together so late on a Sat-
WOULD HE SURVIVE urday evening. Plus they’d have a bet-
THE NIGHT? ter chance of saving the boy if they
were well rested.
Dr. Ebersole had to get Xavier into
the angiography suite as soon as pos- But could Xavier wait until morn-
sible —but first he needed a plan. He ing? Was he stable mentally? Dr. Eber-
was the best-trained neurosurgeon for sole asked the doctors in pediatric ICU,
more than 200 kilometres, but there where Xavier and his family waited, to
was nothing in the medical textbooks gauge whether he was brave enough
that could help with this one. He needed to hold on; everything depended on his
to make some phone calls. state of mind and his ability to refrain
from grabbing the skewer. When Dr.
Meanwhile, his colleague at KU Hos- Ebersole heard back from the hospital
pital, Dr. Kiran Kakarala, an otolaryn- at about 11:30, he made his final call of
gologist (or ENT—ear, nose and throat the evening. “We can wait until morn-
specialist), was at home with his family ing,” he told a relieved Dr. Kakarala.
when he received Xavier’s X-rays. His “The boy is on board.”
first thought was that the odds were
It took both doctors longer than usual
to get to sleep; each tossed and turned
as they ran through various scenarios.
It could go either way.

40 september 2020

“the biggest problem is that

barbed end,” Dr. Ebersole told

the team assembled at 8:30 a.m.

in the angiography suite. He

pointed to a computer screen;

the image on it was an X-ray,

which showed the skewer had a

notch in the shaft near the point.

If they pulled the skewer out the

way it went in, the notched tip

could rip an artery open, but it

was also their safest option.

One floor below, Dr. Kakarala

was with the anaesthetists, insert- X-rays showed the skewer had entered below
ing a breathing tube into Xavier Xavier’s eye, but luckily didn’t hit his spine.
so he could be anaesthetized.

The skewer had gone through his jaw Xavier’s scalp; they would continuously

muscles, and Xavier couldn’t open his monitor the brain’s electrical activity.

mouth widely enough to fit a tube, so If there was any decrease, the technol-

the doctors would thread it through ogist stationed in the corner of the room

his nasal passage and down his throat. would alert the surgeons.

This is painful for adults and worse for Two mechanical arms, one attached

a child. “I’m sorry, but this is going to to the floor and the other to the ceiling,

hurt,” Dr. Kakarala explained gently. were positioned close to Xavier’s head.

They numbed his nasal passages and Each arm held two X-ray devices that

started the procedure. Xavier didn’t moved in wide arcs around his head to

COURTESY OF UNIVERSITY OF KANSAS HOSPITAL complain, even when they struggled to create 3-D images that appeared in

get it around the sharp corner at the real time on a large flat-panel display.

top of the nasal passage. It took about Drs. Ebersole and Kakarala could

40 minutes. Finally, Xavier could be now see the one-in-a-million trajec-

put under—and they’d get a look inside tory the skewer had taken: it had

his head. missed Xavier’s spine by less than two

centimetres. It had missed the cere-

in the angiography suite, about 20 sur- bellum, located at the bottom of the

geons, specialists and nurses waited. brain, which controls functions like

The boy was transferred to the operat- balance and speech—also by less than

ing table and about a dozen little wires two centimetres. It had punctured the

with fine needles were pierced into carotid sheath, which contained his

rd.ca 41

reader’s digest

hypoglossal and vagus nerves, which hand didn’t exert too much pressure
control tongue function, swallow reflex because it was literally on Xavier’s eye.
and the voice box, but didn’t appear to
have damaged them. Dr. Kakarala had one hand on Xavi-
er’s face to help steady his head. Dr.
The skewer had torn the jugular, but Peterson squeezed with his right hand
it appeared to have occluded, or sealed while simultaneously pulling up with
itself, against the skewer. Most impor- the same hand. The skewer was sur-
tantly, it missed both the carotid and prisingly hard to budge. It took all the
vertebral arteries. In fact, it appeared strength in Dr. Peterson’s right arm.
to have nudged them out of the way— Then it did move about a couple of cen-
without puncturing them. I don’t timetres—and stopped. “It feels stuck
know how a kid can be so lucky, on something,” said Dr. Peterson.
thought Dr. Ebersole.
THE SKEWER HAD
the team was as ready as they’d ever TORN THROUGH
be. Now they had a view of things from THE JUGULAR. BUT
inside and outside. Though nobody SOMEHOW IT MISSED
had discussed up to that point who THE MAJOR ARTERIES.
was actually going to attempt to pull
out the skewer—there was no rule The screens showed that it was now
book for this situation—Dr. Jeremy so close to the vertebral artery that it
Peterson, a 32-year-old chief resident, was bending it.
thought it might fall to him, as he was
training under Dr. Ebersole. They tried a new angle to move the
skewer away from the artery. Looks like
To get a feel for the skewer, Dr. Peter- it’ll clear that now, Dr. Ebersole thought.
son placed his left hand at its base as “Okay, go again,” he told Dr. Peterson.
an anchor, while his right hand grasped It worked. Dr. Ebersole watched the
just above his left hand. He nudged it tip of the skewer safely pass the ver-
back and forth ever so slightly while tebral artery.
Dr. Ebersole watched on the screen in
case the movement harmed a vessel; “It’s sliding pretty easy now,” said
the skewer barely moved. “It feels pretty Dr. Peterson. Yet he continued to pull
solid,” Dr. Peterson said. it very slowly, especially as it passed
the jugular.
“Okay, let’s go,” said Dr. Ebersole.
He’d be the eyes, watching the monitor, Then, finally, the last hurdle: the
while Dr. Peterson would work on get- carotid artery. The rod passed it
ting it out. He’d have to do it slowly and
smoothly while being careful that his left

42 september 2020

smoothly, too—and suddenly, it was two months after the accident, the
out. Dr. Peterson quickly put his finger only evidence of the skewer was a tiny
in the hole, in case blood started gush- bump beside Xavier’s nose and some
ing out. It didn’t. numbness on the left side of his face—
miraculously, he had no other perma-
a cheer went up from many in the nent damage. His healing had been
room—but not from Drs. Kakarala, smooth and uneventful. For a while,
Ebersole or Peterson. They wouldn’t his doctor recommended he see a ther-
relax until Xavier was conscious and apist, primarily in case of PTSD.
they could know he was definitely
unscathed. While it appeared the boy Aside for a new fear of wasps, Xavier
was out of danger, it was now a matter has coped remarkably well. These days,
of waiting and seeing how he recovered. he often grabs the leash to take Max
out—he’s no longer scared to walk the
It was 3 p.m. when Dr. Ebersole dog alone. And when he gets a scrape,
entered the waiting room and told instead of going straight to 10 on the
Xavier’s parents simply: “It’s out. He’s pain scale, like he used to, he’ll calmly
okay.” It was the happiest moment of say, “This hurts pretty bad.”
Gabrielle’s and Shannon’s lives.
“Is it skewer bad?” Gabrielle will ask,
“Can I hug you?” Gabrielle asked Dr. and Xavier will laugh—crisis over.
Ebersole, and she did.
He’s still friends with Gavon and
When Xavier came out of the anaes- Silas, who were rescued from the wasps
thesia a short time later, a Spider-Man by members of the fire department
Band-Aid covering the wound on his who aimed hoses at the swarm. Gavon
face and with stitches along his neck, he ended up with 150 stings, while Silas
asked, “Is it out?” Yes, it’s out, his par- had just one, on his arm—and that
ents told him. His eyes filled with tears entire arm swelled from an allergy he
as he looked out the window. “That hadn’t known about. He, too, was lucky
sunshine, it’s so beautiful,” he said. to be alive.

Green Thumbs

To garden well is to be happy amid the babble of the objective world,
untroubled by its refusal to be reduced by our ideas of it.

MICHAEL POLLAN

I like gardening. It’s a place where I find myself
when I need to lose myself.

ALICE SEBOLD

rd.ca 43

reader’s digest

Karen Stiller
placed friendly

notes in her
window during

quarantine.

HEART

As Canada retreated into
self-isolation, I tried to be a good

neighbour from a distance

StNreaxnt-gDeoorrs
MY KITCHEN WINDOW is above my sink. The
washer of dishes and rinser of lettuce can look BY Karen Stiller
out and imagine doing other, better things.
They can also look into the kitchen window photograph by jessica deeks
of our neighbour’s house, so close to ours.
Our houses are old soldiers in a row, shoulder
to shoulder on a worn out Centretown street
in downtown Ottawa.

Our kitchen is often lit up like a glaring
movie set. But our neighbours, two young
men whom I only know in passing, never
seem to turn on their light. Sometimes, as I

rd.ca 45

reader’s digest

do my dishes or rinse our apples, my conflict resolution at Saint Paul Uni-
eyes adjust. Shadow gives way to shape. versity, and is all about being a good
Bent head and striped sweater emerge. neighbour.
Then I see them, standing at the sink,
washing a dish or a tomato, or dump- Somewhere around Day 5, I posi-
ing the pickle juice from the empty jar. tioned Beaker the Muppet in the win-
I am startled every time. dow, and they met him with a cute
stuffed dog. Then, I raised the bar too
On the first Saturday of the COVID- high with a fragment of a Mary Oliver
19 lockdown, I wanted to be a good poem about spring, and that was the
neighbour to the two young men across end of that. Maybe I was showing off.
from me—though I didn’t even know
their names. The reality of the pan- NONE OF THE OLD
demic seemed to be getting worse by TRICKS WORK. WE
the moment. I worried what the weeks CAN’T SHOW UP AT
and months ahead might look like. In THE DOOR OR DROP
our family, we have tried to take the
idea of “love thy neighbour” seriously, OFF COOKIES.
and sometimes that does literally mean
the person who lives in the house next By this time, I was also running into
door, even if you’ve only met them from the guys in the driveway sometimes
the kitchen window. as we walked our dogs, so the notes
had already started to feel a little silly.
I made a sign that said, “Have a nice What if my notes were a chore to
day,” and stuck it on my kitchen win- them, and not charm? What if I was
dow, with a smiley face. A while later less like a mother, and more like an
that day, they taped up a sign on their annoying weirdo?
window with a message for us.
So, I stopped. About a week later, my
“Thank you. You too!” dog, an outgoing goldendoodle, was
We went on like this for a few days, yelling at their dog in the backyard. I
back and forth, like an echo, and I saw one of the guys when I went out to
thought of how this would be a nice shush him.
story for us all: how we communicated
by signs throughout the whole pan- “Sorry, we didn’t find a poem,” he
demic—every single day!—and moved said. “We meant to,” he added, “And
from strangers at the beginning to good then we never did.”
friends by the end.
“Mom, you’re so cool,” my 21-year- “That’s okay,” I replied. “Dewey! Shut
old daughter, Holly, said sincerely. Holly up!” And we both went back inside.
lives with us full-time while studying

46 september 2020

It is so hard to know what it means my family with roast chicken, pine-
to be a good neighbour now. None of apple crumble and quite a few frittatas,
the old tricks work. We can’t show as it has turned out.
up and knock on a door, or even lend
things. I’ve thought about baking Being only and always with my family
cookies and dropping them off, but means that kind of love is also stretched
that feels illegal. and challenged. There is no question
that our neighbours on the other side,
Going for walks these days make me with whom we share the thin walls
sad, or mad. I like what the walks do for of  our semi-detached 120-year-old
my health, but not what they do to my house—a house that has stood through
heart. I hate veering away from people, two World Wars, a depression and the
like we are all infected. For months, Spanish Flu—have now heard my
I’ve avoided my favourite blocks of whole family yell. That’s okay. Love
Bank Street, Ottawa’s long stretch can be loud.
of sidewalk that runs from near the
bottom of Parliament Hill, cuts through After this is all over, I have decided I
my neighbourhood, and continues will finally have our neighbours from
much farther than I ever walked, even both sides, the left and the right, over
in normal times. It’s just too full with for dinner. I will pack our house with
other veering, lurching people. neighbours. We will sit on the couch
together. I can’t be a neighbour now,
How do I love thee neighbour, like as I’d like to be, but I can be a neigh-
I’m supposed to? Love should pull in, bour then. We will all have lived through
not push away. Love takes risks, not this. The pandemic will have knitted us
the side road to dodge a crowd. Love together like an old worn sock and
drops off casseroles and attends funer- we’ll stay that way when it’s all over—
als, always. Love is best and easiest in because it’s finally over.
person, up close and brightly lit, not
hidden in the shadows. And sick peo- I will write this invitation on a piece
ple are for visiting, not avoiding. of paper and stick it on my kitchen
window for them to read, for old, bad
I can’t love like I’ve been taught. We times’ sake. Maybe we can have a little
are all just stumbling along. laugh together about how we tried to
be kind, even during a time when we
So, like most everyone, I have been didn’t really know how.
turning inward, instead, and caring for

Try Again

It’s difficult to learn from success. I’ve learned more from my mistakes.

AUTHOR LOUISE PENNY

rd.ca 47

reader’s digest

AS KIDS SEE IT

“A little high and inside.”

I was driving in a part of One summer day, my understands the park’s CONAN DE VRIES
the city that I had never kids and their grand- rule that dogs must be
been in before and got mother walked the fam- on leash at all times!”
disoriented. “I’m lost!” ily dog, Stella, through
I said to my three-year- a park. Stella suddenly — ANITA BARTY,
old son. bolted from my daugh-
ter’s grasp and took off Hamilton, Ont.
He replied, “You’re joyfully with the leash
not lost, Mom. You’re in her mouth. Our fourth grader cele-
right here.” brated his birthday on
“Well,” my son crutches, so he couldn’t
— JULIE HARRIS, observed, “at least Stella carry the cupcakes into
school without help.
Alberta

48 september 2020