Josh's miraculous survival and recovery path

Hi, my name is Jen and I am one of Josh's close friends. On August 22, 2023, Josh flew from NY to Chicago to meet with clients. While unpacking in his hotel room, he felt the worst headache of his life and his neck froze. He was able to call his brother Justin (a former first responder) and they quickly discussed his symptoms. Justin knew it was bad and had Josh call the front desk and ask for paramedics while they stayed on his cell phone together.

The paramedics arrived and rushed Josh to the hospital where they did a brain scan and knew it was bad enough to move him to a Level 1 Neurological center called Northwestern Evanston. There, the surgeons discovered Josh had a dangerous AVM ( an abnormal, snarled tangles of blood vessels that cause multiple irregular connections between your arteries and veins) in his brain. This AVM pushed so much blood into Josh's brain that he had a double aneurysm burst and cause dangerous bleeding in his brain. 40% of typical single aneurysms result in immediate death. Josh was fortunate to be in the care of amazing doctors, nurses and surgeons because they were able to perform several procedures that glued 95% of the AVM shut, and they coiled each aneurysm to prevent any further bleeding.

Unfortunately, Josh was not out of the weeds quite yet. During one of the procedures, his lungs filled up with fluid and he had to be immediately intubated and put on a ventilator. The ventilator ran at 100% power with 100% oxygen. This was actually the most dangerous part of his ICU stay. Unless his lungs started to pump out the fluid, Josh would have died. You can't go past 100% on a ventilator. Fortunately, the second day, Josh dropped to 90% on the ventilator, then 80% and so on until day 6 when he was able to breathe on his own.

As many of you know, Josh loves to foster strong relationships with his friends and family. During his time in the ICU and hospital (28 days) his loving brother Justin ran QB and scheduled out visitors and actually had to turn away a lot of people because of guest limitations imposed by the hospital. His family and friends were there from the very next morning and rotated shifts to make sure he was never alone.

There were some very rough times once he came out of intubation and they removed the heavy doses of medications like fentanyl and propofol. Josh experienced many hallucinations and paranoid delusions and it was scary for all of us to see this happening. He made it out of the ICU close to three weeks after the initial incident and a week later, he was out of the hospital altogether. Word had spread fast and friends and family from all over the world reached out to help support him. It was amazing to see and feel that power.

After being released, Josh stayed with his loving friend Andrea in Chicago while we tried to sort out continuing care, rehab and physical therapy. There is a long road ahead and we do not know his full limitations, or recovery time. All we know is he is alive, speaking and smiles when he gets to see his family and friends on facetime. It takes a lot of energy for him to speak so calls are typically short, but always uplifting.

This page is a place to help offset any unexpected medical bills, or needs for moving and further care so this is a good place to donate when that time comes. You can also stop by to check on Josh's progress during his recovery. He is strong and motivated and we are confident we will get our Josh back just as he was. Josh sends his love to you all and thank you!