Difference between a champ and chump is “U” 

Current song 
Kanye West – Stronger

The standard greeting “hi, how are you” is one that we hear multiple times a day and usually have a simple response that comes to mind. While I respond with a “doing well thanks, how about yourself?”, deep down I’m really just making it through each hour until my head can hit the pillow. On a typical day I get asked the added “what happened” and I revert back to my standard list of canned responses I’ve created and practiced numerous times for such situation. But, after giving it more and more thought, it’s ironically more freeing to talk about, share my story with others, and be damn proud of it. I mean, what good will all my efforts be buried down inside versus taking others along my journey and opening their eyes to a whole different world I have experienced. I must say, turning this corner took a lot of time and I think it’s important to share that struggle publicly to bring awareness, knowledge, and insight. Knowledge is power right? Here’s some answers to tough questions in no other than A to Z PRFAQ format 🙂

October is AVM awareness month. Using the Mayo Clinic definition: An AVM is a brain arteriovenous malformation – a tangle of abnormal blood vessels connecting arteries and veins in the brain. The arteries are responsible for taking oxygen-rich blood from the heart to the brain. Veins carry the oxygen-depleted blood back to the lungs and heart. A brain AVM disrupts this vital process.

In my case, I unfortunately had the added rare layer of the vein rupturing and blood bleeding out into my brain causing me to have a stroke. 

What causes an AVM?
The cause of AVMs is not clear. Most people are born with them, but they can occasionally form later in life. They are rarely passed down among families genetically.

Was this preventable? 
The short answer is if it was found early on then, yes. Challenge is that with no symptoms, the only way I would have known would be from a CT/CAT scan which I had no reason before this to get one. An arteriovenous malformation can develop anywhere in your body but occurs most often in the brain or spine. Even so, brain AVMs are rare and affect less than 1 percent of the population.

What does the prognosis look like? 
The AVM was removed during an emergency brain surgery procedure in Iceland December 2016. Once back here in the USA, I underwent an angiogram to ensure the AVM was taken care of and that I am cleared with no need for further surgery. The outlook forward is continued rehab for my right sided hemiparesis with no ability to know how much or what will be able to be recovered. 

How am I handling all this? 
Ooooof. Honestly, I am in a good place after being able to embrace acceptance. That in itself is difficult to come to terms and not be stuck in denial, but it makes the path forward more clear and I can focus on moving in that direction instead of circles. Dwelling on spilt milk won’t do anything, but taking action to clean it up and pour a new glass is the key. 

It’s all about facing and sticking through the fight! Whatever the struggle, just fight and don’t give up. This can be applied to something small or large; just when you think that you can’t, you can. If you don’t at least try you’ll never know. If you try and succeed, then you push the bar a little further. Case and point – I’ve been told I wouldn’t be able to walk and I just completed a 5K race this past weekend 10 months post my incident. Lead by example! My brother from a different mother always keeps me in check asking me “Do you want to be a champ or a chump – the difference between the two is U!” So if you are running away, about face and put up those fists and show the world what you got! 

#AVMawarenessmonth #unitedandrare #blessed #aboutface #survivor

Going full circle – Comfortable being uncomfortable

Current Song:
Axwell Ingrosso – On my way

Today is one to always remember (9/12/17) – it marks my one year anniversary at A to Z company and nine months of recovery from my AVM. It's been amazing to see all the hard work paying off as I've now been able to travel across the world, get back to driving, do some hiking, launch some new products at A to Z, cross 1,000 miles of walking since May, and finally rock out my Cole Haan Zerogrands with funky socks 😂

Up next is a 5k American Stroke and Heart Association walk here in Seattle – I've gone ahead and donated my goal amount, so no pressure but please feel free to donate to the cause if you like! Myself, other survivors, and supporters thank you! Link is below: 
http://www2.heart.org/site/TR?fr_id=2458&pg=personal&px=5877563

I believe this journey wouldn't be complete without me going full circle and going back to Iceland for my one year anniversary in December. To have the opportunity to shake the hands of the surgeons and medical staff that saved my life is absolutely something I must do. It's the right thing and think my presence alone, standing, and alive pushing forward is a great gift in itself back to them – ahh just choked up thinking about it. Nevertheless, many of you are awesome and have mentioned interest in coming along with me back to Iceland to also do some sightseeing/hiking; just let me know but targeting the second week in December! 

It only takes one to inspire many and that's all I could ever ask for. Standing my ground to be an anomaly and not the standard is a difficult feat in the world we live in. If you all of a sudden woke up tomorrow with half your body unusable what would you do? How would you handle it? Those questions and accompanying answers are my daily reality. I distinctly remember my response to the interview question at my current employer "Why do you want to work for this company?" Most would go with because it's a unstoppable industry leader or it's on the forefront of innovation and growth. My response was simply "I feel the most comfortable being uncomfortable. If I become comfortable, I eventually get bored or uninterested, but if I can straddle that fine line I can push myself to always be growing, learning, and adapting which I can apply to any company or work situation." It was a long shot but got the call back and offer the next day. So irregardless of my professional or personal life I stand my ground and find ways to incorporate the traits and skills of both. That's why it's so important to be yourself, but first you need to really know and define who you really are and what you stand for. I've gotten to know myself more than ever in these past nine months which has been a HUGE positive in a long list of negatives. 

If I haven't said it enough, THANK YOU to each and every one of you for your unrelenting support throughout my recovery journey! Still a long road to go, but you can count on me not giving up because that fat lady is not going to sing for a long time. Lola (Grandma) – wishing you a happy birthday and know that you are always there looking over me ❤️ #blessed #avmsurvivor #aboutface 

What you see is not what you always get

Current song: William Singe – Shake it off (T Swift cover)

Perception, judgement, assumptions – these are all things as humans we are often oblivious and numb to given the amount of times we subconsciously allow it drive our actions. This happens everyday, multiple times a day – from looking at the person in line at Starbucks with fifty piercings to which "in" designer purse you are sporting. There are many studies, journals, and YouTube videos on this so I won't bore you with the science behind it. What I will say is that we can't escape it, but can find ways to deal with it better and seek to help others understand. 

I look back to the time I got my first car, a white 94' Honda Civic – a whopping 107HP 4cyl engine wrapped in a gold racing stripe and cherry bomb exhaust is what got me hooked me on cars. Who am I kidding – I was the wannabe Fast and the Furious guy of my Catholic high school days. Parking lot meet ups and street racing were a typical Friday night with my best friends always by my side. One look at me back then and you could figure me out faster than Steve Urkel.  

Fast forward to today where the perceptions are of course still there, but the meaning and truth couldn't be further away. My first job was a dietary aid at a retirement home making $6 an hour at the age of 14. I distinctly remember begging my mom to sign my workers permit so I could buy "upgrades" for that Civic; oh man, those were the days. Year 18 in life rolled around quickly and I had a new job at Best Buy slinging TVs, worked as a waiter serving sesame chicken and crab rangoon like it was going out of style, and bought a Lexus that led me to rock my first ridiculous $500 monthly car payment. Graduated college, started my "real" job and of course, bought more cars – enter the Infiniti and Lexus SUV, now rocking a combined $1100 car note at 25. If you aren't shaking your head by now you should be, I was straight up crazy. A few years later at 28, I had now bought a condo in the downtown Chicago neighborhood of River North, working for an airline constantly up in the air traveling the world, and living life up with my girl and pup. Where am I today? Now living in the Pacific Northwest, recovering from a major medical event, single, living alone, hundreds of miles from family and friends, and grounded working for that large orange smiley face. Going along side the car story I shared earlier, I now own a Porsche – the car I've always wanted. At first glance I get judged that I want status and to be "flashy". When I get crap at the grocery store across the parking lot I hear "why didn't you get the iconic 911?" and my response is "because I can't enjoy it with my family and friends with just two seats. Why would I want something that I can only enjoy alone?" The stunned look quickly follows. 

Is it a good or bad perception? Well, of course that's left to an individual level. If you truly know me, I'll come through at times that count the most, will always be there to cheer you on, and more importantly won't turn my back irregardless of the circumstances. I'm always just a phone call away, say the magic word, and I'm there no questions asked. If I have to fly across the world to watch you say "I do", I'll find a way and be there. In return, those that care will support near or far; I went back home to visit and the amount of family, coworkers, and friends that came made my day. 

Yes, things are different, very different, but I have learned how to adapt. Many used to say I was lucky or that I had it all – in some cases that's true and the inverse is as well where I've lost it all. We all value things differently, but for me the constant has always been my loved ones – family and friends are what matter the most in my life. Let others perceive and assume what they want, as long as you stay true to yourself and are happy, that is all that matters. Those that really know you will filter out the noise and see you for truly who you are. So I say let people perceive what they want, be honest with yourself, and those that stick around are who really matter in life. The moments, experiences, and relationships are the things to cherish because l cant take those plush Porsche leather seats to the grave. 

Express yourself!

Current song: 
Tim McGraw – Humble and Kind

Self-control/keeping to myself and expressing emotions has always been a balancing act that I have never been able to figure out. Typically, I weigh to far on the self-control side and not on the expression side. I am a guy who always wants to appear tough, but am also a softy on the inside. I recognize that and am learning to express more emotion, as much as I still compose myself and am able to appear I am doing well where I actually just manage to eek by and pull myself together multiple times a day to make it through. Humble is the word that always comes to mind these days. Happy to share so lets take a look for any given day what it looks like:  

Morning – I'm up anywhere between 3-6am any given morning after falling asleep around midnight the night before. This is coming from the guy who used to love sleep and easily clocked 8hrs nightly – I just can't get comfortable so those nights are long gone. 
After the tossing and turning, I finally give up and get up to shower and get ready for work – this used to take about 1hr in the beginning with the fiasco of trying to get in and out of the bathtub and fuss around with the shower chair but worked hard to kick that to the curb and got down to 15-20mins start to finish. I'm never going to take showering standing up for granted again! I put on my "get pumped" Spotify playlist, get dressed, put on my leg armor, and shoes – about another 30mins added there. 
I pop the earbuds in, pack up my laptop in my work bag, grab an assortment of breakfast bars, Naked juice, and a bottled water – alas I'm off! I walk the 0.7 miles to work like a champ (trying not to let the fear of falling on my face set in) in about 13-15mins. Seattle hills add to the challenge especially without the cane now, but easy does it. No more coffee while walking to work because I'd end up just wearing it and arrive with an empty cup. Get to my desk and wipe the sweat off my forehead then dive right into the emails. 

Lunch/midday – food trucks have been quite a life saver. They generally show up around 11am-until 2pm so plenty of time for me to run down and grab something quick in between meetings before going back and hitting it hard again. Carrying food is always a live balancing act like I'm training daily to be in the circus juggling between a laptop, food, and a drink. Oh wait I need to get my wallet out and pay? Juggling act 2 – dammit I need another hand. Luckily, work got me a MacBook with decent dictation software so I don't miss a beat in the plethora of emails and 6 pager Word docs – I know, like I said "luckily" right?!  

Afternoon – drink the free Starbucks office coffee like it's going out of style 1,2,3 cups down the hatch it goes to mitigate those lost hours of sleep. Time to check what therapy or activity is going on for that day – ranges from physical therapy (lower body), occupational therapy, (upper body), acupuncture, chiropractor, or massage. Many of these are multiple times a week and back to back. Thankfully, I have my outlook calendar to help me manage all this! 

Evening – get home from work around 530pm and change quickly to rush right back out the door for those appointments. Use a variety of Uber's or walking to get back and forth but is hectic in itself. Make it back home and it's now time to start my workout – I take advantage of the awesome gym in my building and am fortunate it's actually pretty empty. Rotate between the treadmill and elliptical machines for a total of 30mins. Then stretch and do repetitive rudimentary movements such as lifting my arm above my head or shifting weight from side to side. Lastly, I TRY to lift weights. Seriously a 5lbs weight feels like 100lbs; hit the reset button and I'm restarting from the bottom up. Goodbye to the days of benching twice my weight. So frustrating; I get discouraged and drop my head, but remember this is going to take work, lots of work over lots of time, so I take a deep breath and pick the weight back up. 

Night – by now it's usually around 9pm and I guess I should eat something – I get so busy that I actually forget! To the phone I go and let's see what UberEATS has got for me this evening – need to remind myself I live alone so don't order too much! Sushi or a gyro wrap are my go-tos and within 30-40mins it arrives and I indulge. It's easily 10-11pm by now and I need to hook up my e-stim unit and shock the hell out of my muscles – specifically my ankle and wrist to rebuild connections to the brain and hopefully not atrophy anymore. Midnight quickly comes and I try to relax for 30mins before laying down and doing it all over again the next day; yes, you read that right I rest for 30mins out of the day. That's all also not including trying to be social and meet new friends since I've only gotten to know a few people here thus far. 
 
If I didn't share this, no one would ever know. When you see me, I always appear like I have it together but in reality, I play it off, suck it up, and legitimately never complain – ok Nike I get it I just do it. This is just the tip of the iceberg as I haven't even began to describe all the emontional struggles, more to come in a future post. All in all, I have nothing to be ashamed of and no regrets – honestly I don't believe there's anymore I can do, and while it appears that I'm torturing myself, if I don't seize the moment and just let it pass I never want to think back and say "I wish I could have tried harder" because I'll know I gave it everything I had. True elite athletes are able to do this and hope to use their tactics in my own approach. Cheers and I'll let you get back to just doing it. 

Back to “normal”

Holy crap. This is the first time I’ve sat still and reflected in awhile – over the past couple months since I returned to work from medical leave on 6/12/17, I’ve managed to travel to San Diego and Toronto, back home to Chicago, and spent almost all of July in 5 cities around India and Dubai. This is my longest post yet so bear with me.

I guess you can say despite everything, my life is back to normal; well, that is depending on what you call “normal”. I’ve come to find that it is defined however you want it to be. Normal to me is probably not the same as say normal is to Justin Bieber, but that’s what makes you you and me me. My outlook is that there’s nothing I can’t do that anyone else can. Maybe I can’t do it the same way, but can find a way to make it work and accomplish the same thing; which is really all that matters in the end. Don’t get me wrong, I’m nowhere near perfect at this and still catch myself frequently saying “oh, I can’t do that” or questioning myself. Well, if I didn’t fight that back down and push forward then I would have missed out on a opportunity to be on a camel in the middle of the UAE desert.

The encounters I would get throughout my travels varied from those going out of their way to help offer to carry my bag, to looks of disgust and shoves to get out of the way. I get it, that’s just how the world is and we all see things differently and often choose what to see and not see. I on the other hand feel that this experience has given me the gift of seeing more than I otherwise would have. I know what it’s like to quickly maneuver snaking my way through a crowd of people and also how to be cautious enough to just to make it through inch by inch standing and not on the ground. I’ve taken so many things for granted that every little thing I’m now hyper aware of – all day, everyday it never leaves me. From the time I take my first step in the morning out of bed to the last one before getting in bed, I struggle and fight because I choose to. At any given time I can literally just rollover on my back and give up; but that’s not me and don’t want to be remembered that way. I could just lay in bed, play video games, and crawl up into a ball, and with all I’ve gone through no one would ever question it, but that serves no purpose. I have a big heart and truly only want the best for my friends, family, and even those I meet in this lifetime. I want and will do some good during my time here on earth to give back and help others. That’s my promise to all of you and I’ll be damned if I break that.

It’s amazing what you can do with will power and motivation. I’ve seen it first hand time and time again and it never fails to deliver. Sure, there will be times where maybe it doesn’t work out, but I’ll guarantee you the experience alone left you learning something and are now just that much wiser. That right there is something you can’t just be witnessed, but needs to be experienced. You learn more about who you are and can help pass your learnings to those around you and make this world we live in a better place. That at least is my hope and look to continue to find the shiny diamond in each of these experiences to share and pass on. Where there’s a will there’s a way. Until next time, cheers to our “normal” lives. Thank you for spending the time to read!

Blessing in Disguise

How many times have you heard or even said to yourself “that’s too hard” when encountering life’s speed bumps? I am also guilty of this but is it really too hard? More often than not, it is this image we create in our mind that instantly plays out and influences our decisions. Now what happens when you have more than one of these images simultaneously – which one do you focus on first? Where do you begin?

In my case, I quickly learned everything that I was in for all at once:

  • Physical challenges – walking, shaving, tying my shoes, typing on my computer
  • Social interactions – how do I go out to lunch or answer when asked “what happened?”
  • Work stamina – keep up with the demand, getting from meeting to meeting, focusing for long periods without getting fatigued
  • Handling emotions – constant change from anger, sadness, and depression
  • Household tasks – carrying groceries, cooking, laundry, cleaning

Day at a time – 24hrs, 1440 minutes, I wake up and remind myself of this every morning.  That is the only way I have made it this far, otherwise you find yourself overwhelmed and become discouraged. By breaking it down, I could start to chip away at the intimidating list one by one. I am learning patience, whereas I was used to fast paced and want it done now. Unbelievable support from my family, friends, and coworkers to keep going, influence others, and make a difference is my fuel to never give up no matter how difficult it gets.

While this was a tragic event, I think in the end the outcome and lesson was well worth it because that is something that no one can take away.  You can say that I am lucky in a way; I have seen life through multiple different lens that many may never see in a lifetime – living a very routine, normal lifestyle to a recovering hemiparesis all before turning 32.  It is truly all about the journey and not the destination. This is no curse, its a blessing in disguise.

 

Forward is the only direction

As much as we sometimes wish we could freeze a moment or stop time, we can’t because life is always happening and there is only one path – forward. It sounds simple and logical right? Well as we all know that is almost never the case, its a complex equation we end up running through our head over and over again with different results each time that eventually drives us crazy. Then you add in something called emotions and now everything is a mess and more unclear than ever.

Picture just seeing the beautiful glow of the northern lights over Iceland and now the only lights you see are from a doctor shining one in your eyes as you lay paralyzed on a stretcher. That was me. Dazed, confused, scared, no idea what is happening or why – only conscious enough to see people out of one eye dressed in white run around and ask me questions that I can’t find the words to respond. I thought to myself, is this it? Is this is the moment I take my last breath with so much more I want to say to those I care about but will never get to? Then a day after, I miraculously awoke and found myself laying there in a hospital bed with my loved ones telling me I had emergency brain surgery from a severe bleed known as an arteriovenous malformation (AVM) that paralyzed my entire right side. Denial quickly entered and I told myself its a dream, so I try to get out of bed and collapse straight to the floor. Well, so much for a dream. I would spend the next several weeks in the hospital and now doing rehab therapy until this day (more on this later).

So, where are you going? If its not forward, then about-face and take a step. This might come in inches or miles, but the key is to keep going and not give up. Don’t turn back, if you want to fix something or do it differently, then do it moving forward irregardless of how difficult it is. What you will learn by pushing yourself forward is something so powerful that can be used for every challenging situation you encounter. My life will never be the same and has been forever changed by this experience, but we must live life looking through the windshield and not the rearview mirror.

 

Pilot

Hello and welcome! My name is Jason Flores and this is the story of my life experiences, observations, and interpretations (whether good or bad) that I hope you can learn, relate, or are inspired by in your own lives. I know what you are thinking, here we go again another plain Jane blog about someone talking all about themselves or belabored topics that are plastered all over CNN. Well, sorry to disappoint because this is none of that. So, why am I here? Well, in my 31 years on this earth I think its important to find a way to give back to all those that have given something to me throughout the years – whether that be a stranger holding a door open to helping bank roll me through college; this blog is my gift back.

I look back at everything I have encountered in life, but ultimately about-face and keep moving forward.  Cheers and hope to see you back soon!