I started going to New York Comic Con regularly around when I started making comics, so 2011. It was the highlight of my year as far as making comics went, the one time I could really focus on that part of my life, without worrying about my day job, or anything else.
I didn’t miss a year that entire time, except for 2020, when there was no con because everything was shut down due to the pandemic. And after more than a year of doing no conventions, no signings, no contact with fans and friends and colleagues, I was looking forward to a triumphant return to the Javits Center in 2021. The universe had other plans for me.
I’m very, very lucky to be writing this newsletter on a beautiful day in October, from my very own porch. I’m feeling good, feeling healthy, and positive about the future. But it almost didn’t happen.
Wednesday morning, I loaded up a suitcase with books for my Artist Alley table, and got on the train to NYC. It’s about a 45 minute trip from my town. The bag was heavy, but not insanely so, and I made my way into the city, over to Javits, and down to Artist’s Alley without much fuss. I felt pretty tired, but figured it was just lugging the heavy suitcase around.
But afterwards, walking back to Penn Station, I had to stop a few times, feeling completely drained and needing to rest. My buddy Joe Mulvey, who I was walking with, bought me some water and something to eat – we thought maybe I was just dehydrated or having a low blood sugar moment. After that, I felt better, so we parted ways and I went home.
But I got home, and things got worse - I was feeling dizzy, and faint, so I decided to lie down and rest - but it got worse and worse - to the point where I started feeling tightness in my chest. I thought for sure at that point I must be having a heart attack.
I decided to go to the ER, where I found out I was in the middle of a heart arrhythmia (which they tell me is different from a heart attack, but man, it sure felt like one). My heart was beating at 260bpm, dangerously high. The nurse thought the EKG was broken - she couldn’t believe I was conscious.
The ER doctors did their jobs exceptionally well - moving fast, they put me under and then shocked my heart back to a normal rhythm, likely saving my life. What followed was six days in the hospital diagnosing and testing, trying to figure out what exactly happened.
I’m happy to say it’s not heart disease - my heart is strong and my arteries are clear - it was a misfiring nerve causing an abnormal heart rhythm. There are so many potential causes, I’ll likely never know what triggered it, but the good news is, I had a procedure called a cardiac ablation on Monday to fix it, and I shouldn’t have to worry about it anymore.
The upshot is that, instead of experiencing a triumphant return to con-going, I wound up spending it all scrolling through twitter and reading about what I was missing. And I’m not upset about it. Do I wish it had happened a different weekend? Of course. But we don’t get to choose when we have health emergencies.
So I just wanted to use this space to say one thing: no matter who you are, no matter what you do, or what you have planned, put your health first. I’m not lying when I say the thought of missing the con meant it took me longer than it should have to make the decision to go get help.
Maybe I just need to lie down for a little… Maybe I’ll feel better after a good night’s sleep. All of it was going through my head, and if I had been a little more insistent in my rationalizing, I might not be here to write this. And that would have been a shame.
There will be other cons, there will be other times to see all the people I wanted to see. I missed it, yeah, but in the balance, it’s nothing. As happy as it would have made me to be there, I’m so much happier being home with my family.
So again, take your health seriously, and get help when you need it. As fucked up as our health care system is in regards to expenses, it’s better to be alive with big bills to pay than it is to be dead. And as disappointed as you might be to be in the hospital, it’s better than being in the morgue.
Take care of yourselves.
- Rich
Scary! So glad you're okay, dude. Hope you're on the mend.
Oh my gosh. So happy you're alright, man. One thousand per cent agree health comes first.