[united]

We may need a general Players' Tribune thread soon. Another tremendous article.

In My Blood
When I arrived in the ER … wow. There were a bunch of doctors waiting for me, with a whole room prepped and ready. As soon as I sat down, the needles were out and the I.V. was in my arm. That’s when I first heard “blood clot.” They took me for a CT scan. I got out of the big white tube and I’m sitting right by the machine waiting to hear my fate, just thinking … is this real?

They bring out the scans and point right to my lung.

“There it is.”

The doctor explained that I had a pulmonary embolism. One of the branches of my lung was clogged. The clot probably started in my calf when my leg was immobilized on the flight back from Ottawa. My lung wasn’t getting blood supply and was slowly dying. The words just kind of whizzed by me. I went to grab my clothes when the doc explained that I had to stay in the hospital for a few days.

He said, “Duper, listen, you basically had a stroke of your lung. It’s serious. If this would’ve went to your heart of your brain, it could’ve been fatal.”

...

It’s easy to say that family comes first. I absolutely love my my children and my wife. But the mentality of a professional hockey player is that you never admit that you’re human. You never admit pain, especially if it’s pain that no one can see.

The Penguins have been incredible about keeping me around the team while I deal with this second blood clot. It can be a very dark place to be away from the game. With my personality, I need to be around the guys. The coaches have requested that I be in every team meeting, and I’ve helped out with scouting. I travel with the team on flights under two hours and offer any insight I can from the press box.