Ten Years Later: A Miracle Woman's Almost 114 Year-Long Life Continues to Inspire Faith in G-d: Part 1

She was my grandmother, and I got to see the frequent miracles in front of my eyes. For the tenth anniversary of her passing, here is a glimpse.

BS”D

My grandmother, Evelyn Kozak (born August 14, 1899 in New York City, as Eva Rebecca Jacobson), lived on this earth until June 11, 2013. At the time she passed away, she was the seventh-oldest person in the world, and the oldest documented Jewish person, two months shy of 114.

The Hebrew anniversary of her passing (refered to as “yahrtzeit”) is the 3rd of Tamuz, which falls out this year on Thursday, June 22.

I want to share some of our miraculous experiences with her, which help to strengthen faith in the Creator of the world, Who gives and sustains life, and is the only true Power.

This story, in a way, marks the beginning of my fight against the eugenicists. In our efforts to help my grandmother live, we discovered how much the Evil Ones wanted her to die.

To our great fortune, she came to live with me, my husband, and children three years and three months before her passing, after a disabling stroke at the age of 110. She greatly enjoyed her time with us, despite being very physically compromised.

The last years of her life were supernatural. I do not know why she merited the miracles and the long life she did, but I do know that we could clearly see Who was running the show - and it was an incredible privilege to live with G-d so clearly apparent.

The cake at her last birthday party.

Her gravestone in Washington Cemetery in Brooklyn. Her grandparents’ stone (Chaikin) is visible behind hers.

I would like to start by sharing something that I wrote in December 2012, while my grandmother was still alive. It was written to thank G-d publicly for the salvations we had seen, and was shown to some relatives and friends, but never published. As I re-read it now, I am awed anew at the miracles that I myself lived through.

In Part 2, G-d willing, I will share more pictures, and a newspaper article I wrote at the time, for a more complete biographical story.

Note: “Hashem” is G-d. “Bubby” means grandmother. “Shabbos” is the Sabbath. I left those words intact to keep the flavor, but translated almost all the other Hebrew words I had used.

I am mostly leaving the journal below raw, as I wrote it originally, to preserve the feelings it captured. Keep in mind as you read this, that it was written about a 113 year old woman, for whom every day was a miracle. This was a woman who related to me how “this time I was supposed to die” (I believe she was referring to her stroke at age 110) but how she begged G-d to allow her to continue to live, and He said “under certain conditions.” When I asked her what the conditions were, she said “as you see me now.” (Her right side was paralyzed and she could never stand or walk again, and she had a feeding tube, among other serious difficulties.) While these entries highlight the medical emergencies she was saved from, they don’t tell the whole story of this amazing period in her life. She spent lots of time with our children, which brought her tremendous joy, and loved telling us stories of her parents and bestowing blessings.

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December ‘12                                      

Dear Friends and Relatives,

This story of miracles is the fulfillment of a repeated promise I made to Hashem to publicize His miracles for Bubby, if He would save her from the pneumonia she had. I have also promised (and fulfilled) this when Bubby was in danger after her stroke, and when she hadn’t spoken almost anything for months. Thank G-d, this is a very powerful thing to promise, and Hashem has helped Bubby in amazing ways after this prayer.

Here, therefore, is the list of the “Top 10” – the ten most dramatic miracles that I can remember from the past three years. Of course, there are so many others – like how Bubby arrived in New York, the five times she threw up and did not get aspiration pneumonia, the two times she just missed falling out of bed, and the numerous (20?) hospitalizations she survived, thank G-d, including her first aspiration pneumonia at age 110, which left no ill effect, and, of course, every moment of every day is a miracle!!

The Top Ten:

1. In December 2009, Bubby survived not one, but a series of strokes at the age of 110. The doctor stated at the time that he would not have expected her to survive at her age. And, although she was left partially paralyzed, she remained able to breathe on her own, speak, and swallow, and much of her cognitive function remained intact, thank G-d.

2.  In November-December 2010, Bubby survived acute pneumonia at age 111. She was extremely ill that Friday night when they brought her up from the ER (to the oncology floor - apparently that’s where they found a bed) with very low blood pressure (she really belonged in the ICU) and I remained in the hospital all night. Her face became beet red, she was breathing maybe 35 breaths per minute, and her heart rate was at least in the 120s (and no one was doing anything!) I spent the night alternating between saying Psalms and calling Leah (my close friend who has connections in the hospital) to get them to do something for Bubby. I promised to donate $500 to charity if she would not need to be intubated. Finally, she was put on BiPAP, which only helped for a while. Yet by morning, Dr. C. was even able to remove the BiPAP! Later, she was even in the ICU for a weekend, but Hashem pulled her through the entire ordeal without needing intubation.

3. During this time period, she contracted the hospital superbug acinetobacter. Many doctors did not think she would survive this. On Chanuka, the doctor tried to break the news to me. Thank G-d, she recovered from this too.

4. When Bubby was finally ready to come home after five weeks in the hospital, I had the flu and she had to instead go to a rehab center for 10 days. There, she was neither suctioned nor hydrated properly. A huge collection of mucus formed in her throat and dried up, causing her to choke on Shabbos morning. Her aide, MD, called me that she was in the emergency room – it was a miracle that she made it there in time. They thought she had pneumonia. I arrived at the hospital with a car service on Shabbos and found her intubated – and they showed me a huge, pinkish-brown piece of mucus, which looked like an organ or a placenta - the size of half of the hospital spittoons - which had been obstructing her airway. How had she survived for so long with it? The next day, Bubby simply extubated herself and she was okay, thank G-d. This was January 2011.

5. Somewhere around February 2011, I was suctioning Bubby, when suddenly saliva started pouring from her mouth. She started gasping, her face turned purple, she then stopped breathing, and her eyes rolled up in their sockets. Her jaw was clamped shut like a steel trap. We called an ambulance, but I did not believe they would make it in time. I desperately tried to continue suctioning her, trying to remove whatever was choking her, but nothing helped. Terrified, I promised in my heart $500 to charity, for Hashem to save Bubby. Immediately, two hard mucus balls, one after the other, popped out of her throat, on my suction catheter, and she resumed breathing. By the time the ambulance arrived, she was doing okay, and an hour or so later, she was happily conversing with a historian who came to interview her!! Miracle one – she survived. Miracle two – no brain damage from the anoxic episode, thank G-d.

6. In June 2011, Bubby survived not only a severe respiratory illness, but an attempted murder as well. This is how it happened: Bubby was in the hospital, and Leah was there very late one night checking on her. Her oxygen level kept on fluctuating and Leah was concerned. In the end, it seemed the problem was just the sensor, which was changed, and Leah left with Bubby doing fine. The next morning, I had a bit of a nervous feeling, but I figured that if Gellen didn’t call me, it meant everything was OK. I tried calling Gellen but couldn’t reach her.

Little did I know the awful drama that was occurring. Gellen had arrived in the hospital and found Bubby’s heart rate around 160 bpm! (Normal is 50-100. I never saw 160 even in the ICU!) Bubby was suffering tremendously, coughing, breathing in the 40s (horribly fast), and desperately needing intubation – while the wicked staff ignored her. Gellen was aghast. The hospital staff’s replies to Gellen’s entreaties to help Bubby ranged from “she’s fine” to “we spoke to her daughter and she said she doesn’t want her intubated.”  A certain evil doctor poked his head in and proceeded to ignore Bubby too. (They lied. What Leah had said was that we wanted to avoid intubation if possible. And they never called either of us to say that Bubby was now doing so badly and needed it!)

Gellen begged them to call me, and they said they did not know my number! She felt so horrible watching Bubby suffer so terribly. She had mistakenly left her phone at home, so she had to call someone to bring it to her in order to find my number on it. This took about an hour – as Bubby further deteriorated. When the hospital staff saw that Gellen was calling me, they paged Dr. C. (suddenly they knew how to reach him) – but by that time, Bubby’s heart rate had reached 180, and then her heart stopped. (That’s what happens when it has to work too hard for too long.) She was gone, as Gellen reports.  No more coughing, no breathing. The nurse held her mouth open until the code team arrived momentarily (all this sudden concern was obviously out of fear of Dr. C.) They performed CPR on Bubby, which was, thank G-d, successful. (The staff threatened Gellen not to tell the story or she’d be thrown out of the hospital. She didn’t tell me because I was pregnant, so she was worried about me. I heard only bits and pieces, and she finally told me all of it now, 1 ½ years later.)

After this, Bubby was really out of it for a couple days. Gellen thought she wasn’t going to make it, but didn’t want to say so. No one thought she’d come off the respirator, and they even wanted to unplug her, apart from Dr. C., who still had faith - but was out sick most of that week. On Friday, the evil doctor, who had ignored Bubby that other day, decided he was moving her to the ventilator unit (which had much lower quality of care). Bubby preempted him by removing her respirator tube herself (and the doctor blamed me and said I did it.) Her extubating herself was a miracle too, because the doctors were not going to take her off the machine. She was fine without it – another miracle. It was also during this hospitalization that Dr. A. recommended that Bubby start taking the inhaled antibiotic tobramycin (Tobi), which has been a wonderful messenger of G-d to keep her lungs clear. She has been on it ever since, on Dr. A.’s advice. Since then, her respiratory illnesses have been greatly minimized, thank G-d.

7. In October 2011, when Bubby was 112, she had her most dramatic miracle of all. It started with her not feeling well, being weak, and having a cough, when my daughter E. was a newborn. X-rays showed a large, white area on her lung, which turned out to be blood that had to be drained from her pleural space with a chest tube. She wasn’t sick (although surviving this issue was a miracle too) and was just supposed to be in the hospital overnight after the procedure to drain the blood. At 1:30 am, I got a call from M., the aide, “Do you want her intubated?” She said that Bubby was “very bad, not breathing.” I quickly said yes, but that wasn’t enough for the hospital staff, as the clock was ticking on her life and brain function. The hospital personally called me a number of minutes later, to verify that I wanted her intubated. (She does not have DNI/DNR, so they should have done it automatically.)

It turned out that she had gotten choked up with mucus. They had refused to suction her and then, when she stopped breathing, they argued about resuscitating her (because of her age!) Until the code team agreed to intubate her, she had been flat-line (no heartbeat on the monitor) for 15 minutes, according to two independent reports. What she needed at that point was CPR, but they weren’t interested in her making it. To cover themselves, the code team stuck the respirator tube down her throat and suctioned – and immediately Bubby coughed and came to life! Those present were utterly shocked at this open miracle – Techiyas HaMeisim (revival of the dead.) This happened right before Yom Kippur, on the night of י"ג מידות הרחמים. In addition to surviving, Bubby had no brain damage. The next day, she was extubated and came home, on Erev Yom Kippur.

8. This happened in about November or December 2011: Bubby had come home from her miraculous revival episode extremely weak and wasn’t really talking. Barely a word here or there, in a weak voice. Even before this had happened, the whole summer, she’d been speaking very little, nothing like the summer before. I was afraid her days of telling stories and having good conversations were over. One night, I was feeling so sad about the situation. I prayed for Bubby to start speaking again and promised Hashem that if that happened, I would publicize the miracle. Just one or two nights later, Bubby suddenly started talking, out of the blue (in a strong, clear voice!). She stayed up talking that whole Friday night and made Gellen stay up too! Since then, she’s been talking non-stop, thank G-d, saying the smartest, wittiest, most hilarious things!

9. In January 2012, one night, Bubby was breathing in a somewhat worrisome way, what I call “squeezing her stomach,” as she breathed (also called “wheezing”). This was before we were aware that she had CHF and need Lasix regularly. Overnight, her breathing worsened drastically, and I was unfortunately not notified. It was a miracle that she survived the night without having a heart attack.  In the morning, I was shocked to see her difficult breathing. Thinking she needed to be suctioned, I started that – and immediately, her throat closed up and she totally stopped breathing. Thank G-d, the Cough Assist machine was a savior; as soon as I forced air down her throat with the Cough Assist, that opened her airway. The ambulance arrived and put her on bi-pap. In the hospital, they diagnosed cardiac asthma and gave Bubby a shot of Lasix – and she came home. Besides for the miracle of surviving this episode, Hashem helped us that we now know to give her Lasix every day as well as when she has trouble breathing. This cut out the ambulance calls, thank G-d!

10.  In October 2012, on Sukkos, at the age of 113, Bubby got pneumonia (after the 6^th time that her food came up her throat). Gellen and Agatha were afraid she wouldn’t make it – she was really sick – but they didn’t want to tell me since they were afraid that I’d go crazy. I was very scared, though, and made many promises, including a promise to publicize the miracles Hashem has done for her if she’d recover and not have to go to the hospital. Miraculously, with just some Augmentin, herbs, and nebulizer treatments, Bubby recovered within a few days at home from aspiration pneumonia – the severest form, which normally requires hospitalization and I.V. antibiotics, and often ends up in tragedy, G-d forbid.

That’s the “Top 10” – but there are more. What about the wonderful, wonderful people Gellen and Agatha, that Hashem has sent us to take care of Bubby? Life was unbearable before they came. They are so caring and devoted and became part of our family. Not only do they allow me to function normally by taking care of Bubby, but they keep her in good health, with Hashem’s help, by their vigilance and diligence. It’s almost impossible to find people like them for any price, so they are a true miracle.

How about Dr. Brum, Sandra, and Leah, who help us more than words can ever say. I’ll never finish if I start describing all their life-saving kindness. Getting to know them has been among our greatest miracles. What about the “Vest” (chest percussion device) acquired during a hospital stay in about March 2011, which helped Bubby avoid re-intubation and greatly minimized her respiratory illnesses? When Bubby had just been extubated and was getting all full of mucus again, breathing with difficulty, and heading right towards re-intubation, Oxsana, the rep from Hill-Rom, came right then to give a presentation in the hospital about the “Vest.”  Dr. C. walked in toward the end of the speech; when she finished, he ran after her and told her that he has a patient who needs the device now. Oxsana went back to Staten Island to get one for Bubby and brought it back to her in the hospital the very same day. After this, Bubby improved greatly and was no longer in danger of re-intubation, and it’s helped her greatly ever since!

This list would not be complete without mention of the miraculous Floradex iron, that Hashem sent us. For a long time, Bubby suffered from low hemoglobin, causing extreme weakness. I especially remember that during the March 2011 hospitalization, she had very low hemoglobin and was so weak that we inquired about the Procrit shot. There was a doctor who basically told me that there was nothing they could do for her. At home, Bubby took high-quality iron pills for months, three times a day, but her blood hemoglobin levels would not budge. Finally, we asked Dr. Ali (it’s a miracle how we got to know him, too) and he recommended the liquid Floradex iron supplement. It’s “low potency,” only 10 mg iron per dose, but so powerful! After only two weeks on it, Bubby’s hemoglobin had risen dramatically – and has stayed good since, thank G-d.

Dear Readers: After I wrote all the above, Hashem added on another huge miracle for us. After a couple months of no reflux occurrences, last Wednesday, December 5, ’12, Bubby was agitated in her wheelchair and leaned forward, causing food to come up into her throat. Despite Gellen’s suctioning it out, Bubby developed a horrible cough, and we were very worried that pneumonia would quickly follow, G-d forbid. She had just used Augmentin and it wasn’t working anymore. She had just come off Zithromax, and Levaquin made her throw up the last time she took it. It was so scary; what was left to give her? Hashem prepared two capsules of Doxycycline, which were left over from seven months ago. This antibiotic had helped Bubby in the past and then stopped working, so we decided to try it again, and Dr. Brum ordered more. I suddenly realized that I was not using the tried-and-proven prayer of promising to publicize this miracle as well, if Hashem would make Bubby better and she wouldn’t have to go to the hospital - so that’s what I said I would do. Thank G-d, after only one night of coughing seriously throughout the night, Bubby started to improve and is Baruch Hashem fine now – actually better than before. (This last Friday, she started saying the blessing on lighting the candles without even any prompting!)

I want to emphasize and remind myself, too, that all the medications and medical devices are just a natural “cover” for Hashem’s constant miracles. Thank you, Hashem, for everything! I hope many people will be drawn closer to Hashem through these amazing manifestations.

Monday, January 21, 2012

Right now I feel overwhelmingly blessed to be able to thank Hashem and publicly praise Him for the awesome miracle that He has just privileged us to witness. On Friday, January 11^th, Bubby had a routine change of her stomach tube, done at home. I could have done it myself, but being nervous, I asked a doctor to do it.

Everything seemed fine, until Shabbos morning, when dark brown blood starting pouring out from around the feeding tube, and then, to our extreme horror, from her mouth!! When Gellen, who always keeps her cool, said “Call the ambulance,” I was so frightened I could hardly speak to them.

After calling the ambulance, I started desperately trying to reach Dr. C., because I needed to know if we should come in to the hospital – a big danger in itself. In the end, he told us to be safe and come check it out.

In the ER, they put some water down the tube and drew some back out – no blood. This is the pattern that repeated itself throughout the ordeal. Blood never came out of the tube – only around it or up her throat.

At this point, Bubby sounded terribly congested, and her O2 saturation went down. I knew she had to be suctioned badly. The staff tried, but Bubby gave them a hard time, so I volunteered – and as I suctioned her, she started throwing up – tons and tons of this dark brown blood! I was so horrified at what I had done, and I was afraid she’d get pneumonia, G-d forbid, from aspirating the vomited blood.

Gellen kept trying to tell me that Bubby had needed to get that stuff out, and I did a good thing, but I felt so guilty.

Little did I know that after I left the room, Bubby started throwing up more blood, and the staff had to suction a whole canister of blood out of her. Yes, Gellen was right, it really did have to come out – all that liquid could have stopped her breathing. Look how Hashem saved her!

Throughout this entire crazy experience, which could have finished off a much younger person, Bubby’s vital signs remained stable and her blood tests relatively fine. So after a CAT scan showed the stomach tube was properly in place, they sent Bubby home, B”H, after Shabbos.

We were so relieved – but did not realize that the ordeal was far from over. As soon as we arrived home, she required suctioning and threw up tons of blood again! This was just the third of 10 times altogether that she would go on to vomit blood in large quantities (plus the two times when smaller amounts just dripped out spontaneously).

The scenario continued to repeat itself. The blood would come up her throat - where was it coming from? Why only up – why didn’t it go down and pass out of her body the normal way?But it didn’t - and we’d hear it gargling around, making her breathing harder. We had to suction, but suctioning was so scary, because then she’d throw up – so dangerous! But leaving the blood in her throat we couldn’t do – plus it could go down to her lungs that way. I say “we,”but I was way too scared to do this. Gellen and Agatha were the brave ones who suctioned Bubby.

Sunday, she threw up blood three times. Now we started feeling desperate. How long could she live if she continued bleeding so much? At what point would we be forced to go back to the hospital? We spoke to the doctors and ascertained that the only thing they could do for her that we couldn’t was an endoscopy to see where she was bleeding – a very risky procedure.

On Sunday night, Dr. Brum brought us Nexium, which is supposed to help stop the bleeding. Monday morning, she threw up again. Hashem gave both Gellen and me two of the same ideas, at the same time. #1 – to squeeze grapes over the site of the bleeding (a segula I had read about in a story months ago) and #2, to call a natural doctor and get suggestions of herbs to help stop bleeding. Dr. Ali’s office was closed, so I called Dr. Morris in Arizona, who recommended three herbs.

I squeezed grapes over Bubby’s stomach a few times and mixed the herbs. After the third time, she threw up once on Monday evening (not as much as before) and then stopped! For 2 ½ days there was no vomiting blood. On Thursday morning, she threw up blood once. Then, thank G-d, that was it. (Of course, we were also praying, giving charity, asking a Rabbi to pray, and promising to publicize the miracle.) It’s easy to fall into the trap of saying it was the Nexium, herbs, or grapes. It was really Hashem who made Bubby stop bleeding. Who knows if, or which, one of those things was His messenger. From a certain perspective, you realize it’s irrelevant. You look back in awe at the greatness of the miracle, and you know it’s just that – only the Hand of Hashem that pulled Bubby through.

And, thank G-d, Bubby did not get pneumonia from all the 12 episodes. This miracle is equally great. (At one point, her WBC went up to 14.3, and she started taking antibiotics. She also had a horrible cough. This medicine is just a cover for the miracle, because aspiration pneumonia really needs IV antibiotics. Thank G-d, her WBC went down. Another way that Hashem helped us is with a cough syrup that Dr. Brum recommended. Bubby was coughing, almost non-stop, and it was terrible. My husband went out at 1 am and bought Robittusin DM, and it was a messenger of G-d. Thank you Hashem for everything!!!

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Please see the biographical newspaper article later in Part 2.

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L’iluy Nishmas (for the merit of the soul of) Chava Rivka bas Yair Yitzchak.