Overwhelmed, From The Beginning...
Hi Folks,
It's me, LeeBird, and I am going to try my hand at doing this BLOG thingy. I actually think I might be good at this, because I have so much to say. I am going to try to do this in the way that I have seen some of the real good movies done. I am going to give the situation, that is relevant today, and then we'll time-travel back to the beginning of where it all began, at least my version.
I am so overwhelmed and do not know where to turn. I just know, that I keep doing these radio station projects , because its what I love to do. I Love, Honor and Respect our military so much, that I have devoted my entire life to them, and I am so thankful to our military each and every day for my freedoms, that i enjoy each and every day. They write and sign the check that keeps me free and I thank you from the bottom of my heart.
The wife and I, who used to be happy in our apartment here in Oak Lawn, Illinois, (Right in the Pocket of safety, SW of Chicago and one block from the biggest trauma hospital in Chicago). Have had our world turned completely upside down. We have felt utterly completely safe here, and now we are forced to move because the landlord is retiring at 83 yrs of age, and is trying to sell the building we live in, and he thinks he can't sell it due to renters on Section 8 Living in it.
We are in no shape to take on a big move like this. The wife has severe medical issues and has a caregiver come in each day to help her with her daily living and needs. I have my own medical issues. I am only 1 1/2 years out from 3 severe spine surgeries, that did not fix the original issue that continues today. I caught the worst case of MRSA that CHRIST HOSPITAL had ever witnessed. They did NOT know how to treat me, and they had to call in an INFECTIOUS DISEASE SPECIALIST, (I was not contagious, that I know of, but I did have the NICEST PRIVATE room in the hospital). I could see our apartment from my 5th floor room. I had to have 3 spine surgeries in 5 weeks, over the 2015 Christmas Holiday Season. I was in the hospital, having and recovering from spine surgeries, while everyone else was enjoying their Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years Holidays and event the Super Bowl. I can remember the wife bring over to the hospital, our dinners for each of the previous mentioned holidays. A Piece of home, it wasn't much, but it was thoughtful and enjoyable, (even though I made things tough on the wife). She had to watch me suffer horribly knowing there was absolutely nothing she could do to help me.
My spine is now FUSED and the original issue was never resolved, and I am left now with "FAILED BACK SYNDROME" that I have to live with the rest of my life. All Because f what I believe is 100% fact that no doctor here in Chicago or the area would correctly diagnose and treat me and my symptoms all due to me having long hair and a bit scruffy in appearance. When I explain why I think this, I wish for you reading this, if you have other idea's then contact me and lets chat. I Love the chat.
Lets TIME-TRAVEL back to the years 2013-2014, when the wife and I first arrived here in Oak Lawn, Illinois and why we came here originally.
When the wife and I Lived in Hamilton, Ohio, (SW Ohio Between Dayton and Cincinnati, Ohio), The wife was not in the best of heath, but she was able to manage and bear her conditions, and we could get out and about if we wanted and needed to. For the most part, we were able to relax, retire and enjoy life. She was happy doing what she wanted and enjoyed doing, and I was happy in my world, (for the most part). I was doing Internet radio at the time, and was enjoying this hobby. It gave me something to do, and I Love my Music.
Time-Traveling again folks.....
You see, I have been playing the guitar since 7th grade, where mom had bought me my very first acoustic guitar, (A Martin Hummingbird Rainbow). I began taking guitar lessons in Jr. High school , (7th Grade), and can still remember those days. Then, In the summer of my 7th grade, mom started taking me to guitar lessons at "Mays-Norris Music" In Middletown, Ohio. These lessons, from what I remember, didn't last that long, because my teacher was about 80 years old, and would try to teach me things, that frankly I did not know and was not interested in learning, and I quickly learned that I had the ability to "LEARN AND PLAY BY EAR"! I could LISTEN to a song, and it wasn't long before I could PLAY IT! I would be so EXCITED, but, there was one VERY VERY HUGE ITEM MISSING.......NO ONE CARED !
I sometimes wonder where I would be at today, if "ANYONE" in my family would have realized what they had and threw away?
From the 8th grade on, I would come home from school and "HIDE-AWAY" in my bedroom, with my KISS posters on the wall, and my FREAK-OUT Lights and Strobe lights going, and just get into my own world of music, guitar and fantasy. I used to listen to KISS ALIVE and dream that I was onstage at a big concert, and hearing the roar of the crowds, and the excitement in my bones of JAMMING IN KISS. Actually, they were my hide-away from what was a horrible violent childhood. My dad and I would get into FIST FIGHTS all the time, each and every day it was for one reason or another, and my mother and brother were caught up in the middle.
You know what folks that are still reading this, and have not turned away yet.....I think I might have to re-title this thing. I am not sure as to what yet, but, I am gonna be honest with ya. I am enjoying writing this, and I hope your enjoying reading this. I guess you might call this "THE RELEASE", as I am now RELEASING DATA from my childhood and more stuff...If you don't mind, and wanna keep reading, I'll keep writing this, and WE'LL ALL GO AN SOME KIND OF UNKNOWN JOURNEY. I don't exactly know where we are going yet, but I do know one this for sure......It is Mothers Day 2017, and it's 3:24 am cst here n SW Chicago, and I can't sleep, and I MISS MY MOM TERRIBLY TODAY!!
Pictured Above are some pics of mom, and the family.
1. The Hayes Family.
2. Mom, Sylba Jean (Bowling) Hayes.
3. Mom, (Not sure of the year taken)
4. Mom, (and dad) Graveside, and Bryan.
Pictured Above is my younger brother by 4 years BRYAN HAYES (Left), and me as we looked in High School. My brother had a lot of friends, and was very popular in school, as I was shy, had very few friends, and was not popular, in fact I was the reject that got picked on all thru school, bullied horribly, almost to the very brink of suicide. I hated my entire life at that stage, and the guitar was the only thing I had.
Pictured Below is my 3 most favorite KISS LP's of all time. I wore these lp's out completely. I could listen to these albums for hours on end, everyday. You see, I was born in 1964, so that put me about 9 years old when KISS formed in 1973, and 13 years old when they released KISS ALIVE I. altho, I really never leaned of them, until they released DESTROYER, (First lp pictured), and when they released LOVE GUN AND THE LIVE VERSION OF THAT LP "ALIVE II" I WAS FOREVER HOOKED"
KISS AND THE GUITAR WAS MY ESCAPE FROM A HORRIBLE LIFE!!
Our Dad was a retired security-guard at a large steel plant, (ARMCO STEEL) in Middletown, Ohio and he also was a SPECIAL-DEPUTY for Butler County, Ohio. I thought of him as "John Wayne with a Badge". It wasn't until many years later, as an adult, that I began to learn that he was very mentally Ill.
We would go to school, (there were extremely secure rules at home, and we thought these rules were normal), and come home and find our bedrooms "Totally Wrecked"! This happened a lot. More to me than my brother, and I am not sure if today, if he even knows that it happened more to me tan him. I think he would investigate our rooms, looking for drugs or something, and when he did not find anything, he would get even madder.
IS THIS WHAT A BLOG IS SUPPOSED TO BE FOLKS, BECAUSE I AM KINDA SPILLING MY GUTS HERE NOW, AND I AM NOT SURE WHY?
If you would like to learn more about our childhood and the hell my brother and i went thru, let me know, and we'll do another blog, just on this issue????
Getting back to the main subject, before our "Train-Of-Thought" Derailed, and I was kinda talking about my love for music and the guitar, and the wife and I living in Hamilton. I met online, and person that said he was not a veteran of the military, but he was building the very first "VETERANS TELEVISION Network, (V-Spann = "Veterans Special Programs American National Network"). He and I began corresponding back and forth online, then on the phone. He would talk to me and the wife many, ,many, MANY TIMES. The wife came to know him as well as I knew him, and the biggest, most important thing was: "THE WIFE APPROVED OF HIM TOTALLY"
He began to send me, (In old school snail-mail), all the proof I would ever need that PROVED he was and is the person he said he was and that the VSPANN project was real, official, and in progress. This was the year before Dick Wolf was to release on NBC out of Chicago, (Where this guy lived and was a native of and from), his first of many new television series' "Chicago Fire", filmed on location at a new Canadian Film and tv production lot in Chicago: "CINESPACE" (https://www.chicagofilmstudios.com/)
This person had actually rented the entire 4th floor, (Kelsey Grammer had had his tv series BOSS filmed just up on the very next and top level, of the same building we were utilizing for VSPANN. My first day that he had taken the wife and I to CINESPACE, I rode the elevator with KELSEY GRAMMER, and later that day, the wife and I met the entire cast , (at that time) of "CHICAGO FIRE". (It was the ONLY of the the DICK WOLF shows on air at the time, and still in it's first year infancy !
This is Mick Grady, the person the wife and I know only on the phone, and on the internet, and the entire reason for our move up here from Ohio to Chicago. He had advised me to begin attending a broadcasting school, in Ohio to get the diploma, (Sheepskin as he put it), and come up to Chicago and bring my radio station with me. Here I could PLANT my radio inside his VSPANN studio, and begin to do live broadcasts from there, and also simulcast anything on VSPANN, and also be able to be used by VSPANN for any reason, related to VSPANN at any time. This was FANTASTIC, and of course I, (we, the wife and I), approved 100%. I began broadcasting School at: (https://beonair.com/) and did better than myself or anyone ever expected, (even though the school was a joke and nightmare, and I HATED IT)!
I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall, that day in late 2013, when the wife and I called MICK: "OK Mick, We're here Lock, stock and Barrell!! We had MOVED TO CHICAGO !!
Now, the wife and I went through UTTER AND COMPLETE HELL once we moved here. That is a story for another day, and another BLOG.
When the Wife and i went into CINESPACE, we were IMPRESSED, to say the least at Cinespace, UNTIL we arrived at VSPANN. Now here was a project, that had been in progress for over 4 years PRIOR to our arrival....IT WAS WORSE THAN A CHILD'S BASEMENT BEDROOM!
Nothing there worked, and they were only a small handful, (I only met a total of 6 persons that even said they were associated with vspann), of volunteers. There was no green screens, no working camera's no working computers, nothing worked there,and most of all THERE WAS NO VSPANN!!
Brief History:
Let's set the stage here....
Mick had sent enough information and details, over the phone to myself and the wife, over the computer to the both of us, and in the snail mail as well. We had letters, pictures, signed and dated documents from the mayor of Chicago and the Governor and more. Mick had sent and made available to s, everything we would ever need to know the the VSPANN PROJECT was real and approved by every official authority in every official capacity needed. "EVERYTHING"!! Now, the wife has a son that Lives in Hamilton, who is now freshly married with a little girl, (The Grandkid), and she also has a daughter tat lives in Trenton, Ohio. Moving to Chicago ment UPROOTING the wife from her kids and he new grandchild, yet THE WIFE APPROVED THE MOVE.
It wasn't long after we mved here and settled into our apartment in 2014, that the VSPANN project had failed totally. The people involvved had no idea what they were doing. NOT A CLUE. The wife of VSPANN'S founder had 4th stage cancer and they had a little girl that was very sick too. At the studio, I never saw more than 3 people at any given time, and most of the time, only 2.
This was to be a 24/7/365 new tv Network, to be seen on "NBC" out of Chicago?
What a JOKE ! A Horrible Joke, and it put us an a treacherous situation. Mick and I stopped talking in early 2014, once we got our apartment, he helped us move in and WE NEVER SAW HIM AGAIN....TO THIS DAY !!
I Had AMERICAN HEARTS RADIO at the time we moved here
Below is some poster from AMERICAN HEARTS RADIO:
Wasn't long before we lost AMERICAN HEARTS RADIO. The move here destroyed the radio from my end.
I began to build other stations. I built them, and they would fail, one right after the other.
I don't know what I was doing wrong? I tried and tried and tried, and failed and failed and failed.
Then I created HONOR VETERANS RADIO, (The present ongoing radio I own).
It seemed to be finally grabbing some kind of foot hold, and I was excited. This was Late 2014 era, about September.
Then the bottom fell out.......
I was walking to the store, 6.5 blocks away from our apartment in September of 2014, and I felt some kind of shooting pain in my right leg and foot. It hurt like anything, and almost put me on the ground. I went the next day to a doctor.
We had Settled in Oak Lawn, Illinois, right exactly across the street from the big hospital, (Christ Hospital), and down the street, (To the right as facing the hospital on 95th street), there was a doctors office pavilion that was under construction when we first moved here, and when it finally opened I was one of the very first patients. I ended uo seeing every doctor and nurse the place had, and no one did anything to me or for me, except X-RAYS AND C-SCANS but no MRI was ever ordered, and If it had been, I would not be in the permanently damaged state I am in today with my "FAILED BACK SYNDROME"
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Failed back syndrome
Classification and external resources
Specialtyneurosurgery
Failed back syndrome or post-laminectomy syndrome is a condition characterized by chronic pain following back surgeries. Many factors can contribute to the onset or development of FBS, including residual or recurrent spinal disc herniation, persistent post-operative pressure on a spinal nerve, altered joint mobility, joint hypermobility with instability, scar tissue (fibrosis), depression, anxiety, sleeplessness and spinal muscular deconditioning. An individual may be predisposed to the development of FBS due to systemic disorders such as diabetes, autoimmune disease and peripheral blood vessels (vascular) disease.
Common symptoms associated with FBS include diffuse, dull and aching pain involving the back or legs. Abnormal sensibility may include sharp, pricking, and stabbing pain in the extremities. The term "post-laminectomy syndrome" is used by some doctors to indicate the same condition as failed back syndrome.
The treatments of post-laminectomy syndrome include physical therapy, low force specific chiropractic care, Microcurrent electrical neuromuscular stimulator, minor nerve blocks, transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation (TENS), behavioral medicine, non-steroidal anti-inflammatory (NSAID) medications, membrane stabilizers, antidepressants, spinal cord stimulation, and intrathecal morphine pump. Use of epidural steroid injections may be minimally helpful in some cases. The targeted anatomic use of a potent anti-inflammatory anti-TNF therapeutics is being investigated.
One and a half years went by, and several doctors later, I finally found the right doctor, that took one look at my X-RAYS and went nuts, (per se). He immediately ordered an MRI and called me back to go over the findings. He input me to the hospital, did spinal surgery the next day, and this was early November 2014. The first of 3 Spinal surgeries in 5 weeks.
Nothing worked, and I live with constant daily pain everyday, in my back, legs and right foot.
NOW THE WIFE AND I ARE FOR THE MOST PART 'EVICTED".......
MORE TO COME..............(STAY TUNED)..............
