JUST SO GLAD TO BE ALIVE

Mindy D · ‎05-23-2010

I'm in the Miami area. Just north of there, in Broward County, Florida. We were expecting a direct hit from a Category 5 Hurricane Irma. Thank G-d the storm veered slightly west. I have 29 giant windows on my home and no shutters or impact glass. Accordion shutters were about 30K when I priced them years ago. We've been thinking about impact glass, but it costs so much. We were set to sleep at our next door neighbors', as they have steel window panels. This is really just a moot point if the eye of a Category 5 hits you. A Cat 5 means TOTAL DEVASTATION. We are so lucky. The eye passed over one of the keys, Cudjo Key. We haven't found out if anyone stayed behind and was killed. I hope not. We were without power until last night. There was no breeze and the indoor temperature was the worst in my many years of after hurricane experienced. We were going to drive to a friend's home that had power, but our oak tree fell into the street, blocking all the residents in. We couldn't leave until we found someone to remove the tree. We waited and waited. When the tree was cleared; my husband went outside to start the car and the car wouldn't start. At that very moment our power came on. My husband had become sick with heat exhaustion. This illness has nothing to do with exhaustion. It's brought on by exposure to high heat and loss of body fluids and electrolytes. It causes vomiting and other symptoms. The next step would be heat stroke. Heat stroke is much more serious and kills quickly. It has nothing to do with stroke. You could hear the screams of joy from the open windows on our block when the power came on. People were dizzy and throwing up. To make matters much worse, our water was under a boil water order, so we've had no water to wash with. We have enough bottled water for drinking. We were lucky. The stores were out of water. Our water is not expected to be safe for an estimated 48 hours. The day before the storm, my husband's older iPhone died. The guys at the local AT&T were due in to board up the store. They helped my husband get a new IPhone 7S. Thank G-d again. During the storm our DIRECTV satellite dish flew off somewhere. They'll be here to give us a new one on 9/23. It's great to use the cell phone and an iPad for watching TV...we get Directv on them even without the dish being hooked up. Luckily, we took out cash before the storm because ATMs were out of money or not working where power outages were and bansk were closed. A few eateries have opened, but they are cash only and people have run out of food. We have to throw out all of our refrigerated foods. Luckily we had gotten some gasoline. Many couldn't get gas at all. We couldn't get C or D batteries; everywhere we went was sold out and we went to get them early. Our storm radio was a great thing to have. The battery candles from Candle Impressions were awesome. The old towels I keep for water coming in helped. We have some costly damage. We have insurance, but I'm not sure what this will cost. We got our first mail yesterday. A bill! Of course, what else would you expect. My husband is at a friend's in Dade County showering and hopefully getting his car fixed by our friend. I have no idea where anything in our house is right now. I hurriedly packed for an evacuation that could last weeks. We scrambled to put things in plastic bags to protect them all over the house. We searched all over for papers we'd need if we were gone awhile. We even protected the ashes of our parents. We brought down many items from the second floor. I scrambled to transfer valuables to luggage to take with us. My prayers are for everyone that went through Irma or Harvey. Even through all this I AM SO HAPPY TO BE ALIVE.

stellabystarlight · ‎03-31-2010

Yes, you are so lucky to be alive. From reports I am hearing, the West Coast of Florida may not get power for another 3 weeks. How those people must be suffering! What a catastrophe - just hope it never happens again! Stay well and safe!

MalteseMomma · ‎03-09-2010

My heart,thoughts and prayers are with you all {{{{{hugs}}}}}

qvcfreak · ‎03-10-2010

Praise God that you and your DH are ok. It could've been much worse. Think positive and hang in there. It can only get better.

Kachina624 · ‎03-10-2010

Sounds like you've had quite an experience, and one you'll not want to repeat anytime soon. Hope your life will soon be back to normal and thanks for relating your experience.

New Mexico☀️Land Of Enchantment

OfCourse · ‎08-26-2017

All the best to you and your husband, @Mindy D!

Mominohio · ‎08-08-2010

@Mindy D

I'm so glad you are alive and well, and so very sorry for what you have experienced. I'm sure that even though the worst is over, you still have a long road ahead of you in repairs and getting back to normal. I hope all goes as well as it possibly can for you and everyone that has been affected by these unbelievable storms.

You noted so many things in your story, that I hope others will read and learn from. I'm in no way chastising you as your sharing here could be of much help to others, but there were so many things that you did not prepare properly for, and you now see the light and how important it is to be proactive.

The cost of the glass and shutters sounds like something many people could not afford to do. That is totally understandable, as we all have only so much money to work with, and storms like this aren't usually so far reaching and severe, it would seem that there would always be something more pressing to do with limited funds than that.

Your story, and that of others on these boards the last couple of weeks, really brings to point though, that so many people wait till a disaster is on the horizon before they do the simplest things.

Batteries, water, gasoline reserves at home, cash reserves at home, food that needs little or no preparation, generators and the like are not going to be plentiful once a storm has been spotted and is in the forecast. It is the same here with ice storms and snow storms.

I hope more people after watching these disasters unfold on television (or living through them) will be more proactive and not wait to get things like this in order, and have a regular stock of such things. I am glad you had the flameless candles, as we have used them in power outages too and they give me great comfort to have safe lighting (not worrying about actual flames left burning overnight) all through those totally dark nights.

Preparedness has been such a bad word, and people who live by it have been ridiculed in the past, but I think many will take stock of doing things differently in the future.

We all have to make plans and contingencies. We have to know the things in our area that many give us the most cause to have to be prepared and set a plan in place.

I can sympathize with you dealing with everything a jumble and a mess right now, as you had to pack up and move so many things, hoping to avoid the water and wind. We had some horrible rains here this summer, and I was afraid the lower level of my home was going to take on water, and had to move a number of things up higher in the house. It seemed to disrupt things quite a bit and seemed to take much longer to put back together than it did to tear it up! I wish you an easy time getting things sorted and back in place.

Your statement about having to look for important papers should be a good warning to others too. Several years ago, I went through the several places we kept our important papers, went through them and discarded so many things that we really didn't need, and made one file folder for those most important (wills, birth certificates, SS cards, titles to cars, deeds to property, insurance information and policies etc.). I now keep it in the safe, and everyone in the house knows where it is , what is in it, and it is now easy to grab if we must leave quickly, or will be safe (hopefully) during a fire.

Thank you so much for sharing your story, and I'm sure it will open the eyes of many, to consider things they never even thought about before, because of your harrowing experience.

Prayers for everyone going through this nightmare.

GCR18 · ‎07-03-2013

Great news. You can't take life for granted. Most stuff can be replaced. I read in the paper that eight people in a nursing home died. I think it was in Holiday. They had no electricity, the windows were closed and it was extremely hot. It's not known if they had a generator and it quit. The police are looking at pressing charges.

Poodlepet2 · ‎03-09-2010

@Mindy D, so glad you made it! I am writing from the West Coast in Punta Gorda: we had to evacuate at the last minute because of storm surge that never happened....thank G#d!!!! We didn't lose electricity which is amazing.

Mindy, the whole state is a mess. Places are beginning to flood that hadn't flooded before because of sheet flow. Tourism-which our state and the Carribean lives on-is gone.

It's a different Florida.....

First things first....now that your AC is on, get some sleep. We lost power at my son's where we evacuated to, and I'm still catching up on sleep I think....or maybe it's minor depression setting in.

At least after Charley, we could take haunts to other places to escape the destruction here...once again, the entire state has taken a hit-North Florida is flooding!

We will make it through this MindyD: the biggest problem is getting gas and supplies through.

Love and Hugs,

Poodlepet2