Monster Gratitude

Seven Summits – Mt. Kilimanjaro - as experienced by Donna Carrigan

20 days ago on the rooftop of Africa I had the most beautiful moment of my life. Mt Kilimanjaro served me a piece of humble pie and provided me with a view from the top that made it easy to swallow.

White. Baby clouds white. Dollie White. Fluffy White Kitten White. White white white. The sun shone on my cheeks and glaciers and rolling clouds surrounded me as far as my eyes could reach. I was in a frozen sea of white. I felt like I was inside heaven. Or a giant ever expanding home made marshmallow. Or precisely all of those things at exactly the same time. To speak of the sense of wonderment that filled my body fills my eyes with tears. I can only begin to hint at the greatness of this moment 19,340 feet above the sea, to the frozen sea. The summit of Mt.Kilimanjaro. Filling my tear ducts was a combination of the struggle it was to get to the top and the sheer beauty of the landscape.

Overtaken with joy and nausea, gravity opted for me to sit down on a lonely rock. My head heavy, fell to my feet. My body considered which direction my shoulders would fall if I fainted. My headache was growing and already was splitting the back of my head in two. Just like the honey dew melon halves you see plastic wrapped at the grocery store.

With a deep breath at 70% oxygen my air felt cut short. I felt the panic in my breath that one time I went scuba diving off Ogden Point with my friend Ryan. My buoyancy was all wrong and I was shooting to the surface and forgot for a moment I was on air. My chest felt heavy under an atmosphere of pressure and Ryan reached his hand for me to right my floatation. It calmed me. My breathing calmed to normal. But here I wasn’t underwater and no one was there to reach for my hand. The glacial giants made me feel less alone but I still felt panic. My porter had gone and so had my oxygen tank. My head was pounding and I was fixated on trying to take a deep breath. Maybe 65%. The scenery in my peripheral view distracted me for a moment. The pain seem surreal and giving up on feeling full of O2, I took another half breath and puffed my chest up from the rock. Lifting my chin up into the sky I took another look across the horizon, over my pink nose, of the melting glaciers that surround Uhuru peak, the peak they call Tanzania’s ‘Freedom’ in Swahili.

“This is it” I thought. “Enjoy it” Holding my head up, my vision became wobbly. I felt like I was back in my sailboat playing in the waves. For a moment I was chasing a BC ferry into Pender Island’s Otter Bay Marina, like two summers ago. This waking day dream was a sign that my time at the top was over. My weak knees echoed the thought by beginning to shake uncontrollably. The severe reaction I’d had to Diamox, an altitude drug prescribed to those who attempt high altitude, was raging its effects on me. Delirium, rash, swollen face, nausea, cold sweats…. I was at the point of exhaustion and my body began shaking top to bottom. I knew I had to keep moving and so I turned to the crater and started my decent down the mountain.

As quickly as I saw heaven, it was now behind me, forever preserved. With the moment tucked in my pocket, I could only think of how not to vomit on myself, a danger especially in the cold, and brain power went to how to get my legs to move more consistently.

In hindsight I was risking a great deal strolling the edge of the crater, so delirious, but needed to hike to Stella point where a deep decent awaited. My teammate called out to me, and I found the echo of his voice absorbed in the vacuum of high elevation: “Donna! Donna! ” “Stay to the left!” in his British accent Sam’s voice came to me, clear as a bell.

It was a real warning, I was delirious and wavering along the edge of a steep trail that offered to take me down the side of the mountain at the speed of my existence. “To the left!” I responded with a swagger and then picked up speed. “With Thanks Sam” Deep breath. One more. “‘I don’t feel well”.

“This is how climbers die on Everest.” I think to myself. The combination of driving forward to the summit (summit fever, I suspect) and altitude sickness (the fog of reason, I can tell you with all certainty) made it so the energy needed to climb down the mountain had been forgotten, or seemed absolutely unimportant.

After this thought, the adrenaline of the summit left my body and suddenly I became very cold. I could feel my bones.

That was my last real memory from the summit. Three porters, a tank of oxygen and two slips in and out of consciousness, continued waking hallucinations and a bashed knee was the recipe required to deliver me to camp.

My next memory is holding my head in my hands between my legs. The head splitting had turned into general mashing about with a sledge hammer in all sorts of directions. I am back at camp and despite the noise in my cranium I find myself retelling a blur of memory: an interrupted fall down the mountain in three places, all from exhaustion. Chicken brought to me in tinfoil. A juice box. Defeated, I negotiated the thought that we still had another three hour hike ahead of us to the next camp. My team mates doting on me and supporting me as best they could. Liquid gel advil, warm water easy to swallow for my swollen face.

Honestly, all I could think was three words: “Don’t climb Everest.”

And as sea level came closer, the Mt. Kilimanjaro python that wrapped around my brain slowly let go of its pressure. The lower altitude a silent beacon cooing for it to let go and make room for the next ego filled climber. Soon my thoughts began to expand past three words. My rational now so full of oxygen it announced directly to my eardrums that this was likely the best thing that had ever happened to me.

Why the best ‘thing’? It was the best thing because all told it was the most beautiful experience of my life. And by beautiful I mean that I was given the rare opportunity to push my physical limit and yet feel the absolute safety of a team, which allowed me to cheat the odds and crawl to the roof of Africa. It was beautiful because our hearts were reaching the summit for a cause meaningful to each one of us. The cause: the Power To Be Adventure Therapy Society. It was beautiful because my headache was so intense on Summit day that I couldn't put my pants on. It was so beautiful because I could use the word beautiful eight million times and I would still be describing it.

I was gifted a high altitude lesson from the fourth highest of the seven summits: I learned that if I feel safe, I can push all the limits.

And for that, I have monster gratitude.

A very special thank you to every one on the Power to Climb Team, who each in their own way contributed to my summmit by creating the space for emotional and physical safety. A life time of memories - you are all absolutely da best.