7: The Resurrection of Jake

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Legends with a Z dot com is legendary fun. Blink is intended for mature audiences as it discusses topics that can be upsetting, such as drug use, sexual assault, and emotional and physical violence.
Content warnings for each episode are included in the show notes. Resources for drug addiction and domestic abuse can be found in the show notes

and on our website, BlinkThePodcast.com.

The testimonies and opinions expressed by guests of the show are their own

and do not necessarily reflect the views of myself or affiliates of this podcast.

A quick update on Blink.

Many of the interviews you've heard so far were conducted a few years ago, but since then, there have been some major developments. So I'm tracking down a few more key people to bring you the most complete version of Jake's story to date, and Blink will return April 13th to finish out this 14-episode series.
Thank you for your patience, and thank you for listening to Blink. Every time I sit down with Jake, his stories come to life in vivid detail.
He doesn't just recount what happened, he paints the full picture. The agony of his injuries, the feel of the room around him, the voices that broke through the sterile hum of hospital machines.
He tells me that this obsession with detail comes from years of being unheard,

and then, when he could speak again, years of being misunderstood.

But what makes Jake's story truly stand out, aside from about a thousand things,

is that it isn't just his memory filling in the blanks.

This story has receipts, a staggering paper trail of medical records, legal documents, and countless screenshots. Proof collected by Jake and those who lived through this nightmare alongside him.
Thank you. Jake's life is anything but ordinary.
It's brutal, unpredictable, and sometimes it hits him like a fork to the nuts.

I start becoming unparalyzed and I'm like making baby sounds.

And there's a video that I put on YouTube of me eating chocolate pudding with a spoon.

I'm dying laughing because I thought it was so funny that I just couldn't do it and pudding was getting everywhere, cracking up. Anyway, I'm kind of, I was about to say master to the pudding, but that's a stretch.
But you know, they were like, let's try a fork. And at this juncture, I could only barely hold a fork, but I've successfully got a bite on a fork from a plate that was in my lap, so I could only eat off my lap.
And they were like, what do you like to eat? I'm new to eating too, and I'm like, blueberries are good for my brain. They brought in all these blueberries from me.
It was great, and I had blueberries balanced on my lap and i'm taking this fork and i i just can't get them on the fork and it's so frustrating so i did one of these hot toss and it missed a cup and it went directly in my balls. Like, like,

my balls. Like, like, my balls were now on the fork, kind of.
And I'm like, ah! And these nurses come in and they're like, what's wrong? And I'm like crying. And they're like, did you, you know, talking to me like, baby, did you hurt yourself? Did you hurt yourself? and they'm like crying and they're like did you know talking like baby did you hurt yourself did you hurt yourself and they're like they're like you gotta show us you gotta show us and I'm like no and and she like lifts up the towel and she goes uh uh let me call in the wound nurse and I'm like, oh, God.
Next thing I know, I've got like eight people in my room just like looking at my nuts, you know. And I don't even want to look.
Then there was an order put in for a cup and safety glasses. And it was the first time in this hospital's history they had to medically justify buying a baseball cup for a patient.
It's now 2019, two years after Jake was diagnosed with acute, toxic, progressive leukoencephalopathy. Jake was determined to regain his mobility, his speech, his life.
And luckily, the team at Western Massachusetts Hospital was just as determined to make it happen. Because I was so hungry for more therapy and homework, not only would they give me the homework, but when another patient would refuse therapy or, like, they had an opening, they'd be like, Jake, I got an extra 30 minutes.
Do you want extra therapy in it? Yes yes. Oh, yes.
I'd even be like, can I come in the gym and use a bike when you're busy? Like, help me transfer and that's all I need. I'll be quiet.
Like, I was eager. That motivation, which I must have said before, a lot of it had to do with my wife.
Getting through it and getting to the point where I could live with her, that was on my mind 24-7. Jake still hopes to rekindle things with his wife, but deep down, he knows he can't count on her.
If he's going to move forward, he'll have to rely on himself.

My wife has, she doesn't call, she doesn't text, she doesn't visit. I've come to the conclusion that I'm just going to focus on me.
And soon his thoughts turned to his family. I really would like to talk to my family.

I'm sorry I'm smiling.

It's like so, it's like not funny at all.

But I had this hope that my wife would come back to me.

And she had such control over me.

Where I felt that even if I secretly sent

and could send a cryptic message to a family member,

that she would find out and flip out on me

and be mad at me and things would be even worse.

So, you know, I was just like, family isn't an option.

And I knew that I had to make a choice

between my wife and family.

I'm going to go ahead and get it. Family isn't an option.
And I knew that I had to make a choice between my wife and family. I mean, this sounds fucked up to say, but things were so bad and I was in so much pain.
And if I could have talked on hospice, I would have chosen my wife. and that's like saddens me to say that but I was just so

so fucking sick. I was so in so much pain.
She took really good care of me. She knew how to take care of me the best.
Once I kind of mourned our marriage and like realized that it wasn't going to work i was just like started to think about my family and think about them wondering they get them dead and not knowing and i'm like that's like really crazy and and you know i was very lonely and sad and broken, like, physically and mentally still. And, yeah, it was just time.
Like, time to find this family. My wife, Ellen, she had all my belongings.
She had my phone. Wouldn't give me my phone.
I think the hospital even asked for, like, some possessions of mine. You know, who knows what happened there.
I didn't have anything. I didn't, I didn't remember.
The hospital got me an iPad, but like, I didn't remember my Apple ID and password. I didn't even know if it still existed, even if I did.
So it was like starting over. I had no money because my benefits weren't going to the hospital.
I really had nothing, right? So like these nurses and aides and they were like buying me shampoo and snacks and just like, you know, but they were like, can we find someone for you?

Do you want us to find your family? They would ask me, what's your dad's name? It's your brother's name, sister. And maybe with my broken speech, it didn't translate.
That's why they couldn't really find anything for me. I'm like laying in my hospital bed one evening and this number shoots in my mind.
I'm like, I think that's my aunt in Texas's number. I mean, who remembers numbers now? It's programmed in your phone, even then.
If I was to remember, there were like a few select numbers I would remember, like significant other, my own, maybe one other. There was no reason I should have remembered this number.
I asked Jake if he'd called Varda many times in the past. Perhaps he'd seen her number often enough? He said no.
He didn't speak to Varda on the phone much. Her number was programmed in.
He never looked at it. And I ring the call button for the nurse.
It was like this little button. I could slam like this because my fingers didn't open yet.
Nurse comes in. I'm like, quick, quick, quick, get a pen, write this down before I forget.
They write it down, and they're like, as excited as I am.

And you can make FaceTime calls through Gmail.

I had to put it into the FaceTime app on the iPad.

My calls rang like probably three times, four times. Four times? Casino-style games.
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Legends with a Z.com is legendary fun. We had just flown up to Dallas for our daughter's medical school graduation.
And we went to our Airbnb and we were just, literally had just gotten there. And my phone rings and I go over to it and it's FaceTime.
I'm like, who's that? And it's Jake lying in a hospital bed. And he's like, hi, what is that? He could barely talk and it sounded like that.
And I was just like, oh my God, you're alive. And I said, Adam, come here.

Come here right now.

Tell me if I'm hallucinating.

Because it was so freaking mind-blowing.

I think we said, you're supposed to be dead.

We thought you were dead, yeah.

I think he joked, he said, am I in heaven?

Are we all in heaven?

You know?

He had a sense of humor still right there and there.

And so we started putting little pieces together. We talked for like 20 minutes and one of the main questions was like, where's your wife? I was kind of like, she's not around, you know? And at that point he was still with Elle but he was starting to voice little bits of doubt about her.
But then our kids arrived, and we were like, come here, come here, you're not going to believe this. And everybody was just flipping out.
It was a very, very happy shock. Were you the one to deliver the news to other people in the family? Yeah, to let Jerome know, which was really weird.
They started sending me numbers, and remember one of the main things Varda said after was, have you spoken to your dad? And this is painful to talk about. I don't like talking about this part.
Have you spoken to your dad? And I was just very sharply like, no. What? Why not? And he said, I'm mad at him.
I said, why are you mad at him? And he said, he hurt Al. So she had told Jake that about the whole strangling, quote unquote, and Jake at that point still believed her.
Part of me, although I never really could have seen my dad strangling my wife, I knew how much she pushed his buttons and everyone's, and I'm like, well, people break. If anyone could push someone hard enough to strangle them, it'd be my wife.
You know, I heard this ordeal. I didn't see it.
In my mind, I was like, I don't think he strangled her. But who knows? At the time, I didn't see my my wife lying I didn't even want to talk to my dad I was like you know what something happened I don't know what it is no so yeah I had to call Jerome and but he you know he wasn't he didn't spend a moment being hurt that Jake didn't want to call him.
He was just so happy he was alive and improving. And he said, we'll work it out eventually.
It'll be, don't worry about me. That was his reaction.
Don't worry about me. Jake asked his family to send him their numbers and the numbers of other family members.
The other numbers I got were my stepfather, Eli Weiland, and my sister and brother, Sophie and Dave, and my other stepsister, Katie, on the other side. And I reached out immediately.
Probably within a few moments of getting Eli's number, he was the first person I reached out to. I called,

but he must have had like the do not disturb thing on. So I'm right.
The voicemail.

And I got one of those. No, I got one of those automatic, like, can't talk.
I'll call you back messages. So he hit that.
And I just replied, I think I got help. And I replied like, Eli, it's Jake.
I'm alive. Call me or something.
He didn't respond for quite some time. I was in this seminar, a thing they called Family Constellations.

I don't know if you're into this kind of stuff, but okay, so you go and there's this energy thing.

And, you know, it's a room full of people and different people get up and they go through these energy processes and so forth. So they only do a couple each time and it was my first time ever.

And I raised my hand and they called me up and I did I did this whole family constellation thing with me and my father and his father and all these energy things. And Max, I don't think Jake was in it.
I just thought who the players were. Family constellations is a unique form of therapy designed to reveal hidden family dynamics and generational patterns.

In a group setting, like the one Eli was in when Jake called, participants step into the roles of family members, basically role-playing and acting out scenes that offer fresh perspectives

on relationships and past traumas so that the individual can see it and interact with it.

And this process helps uncover unconscious patterns, inherited wounds, and emotional blocks. And maybe even act as the first steps towards healing strained relationships.
And then I sat down and then we went on break and I checked my phone and Jake had called. A year to the day that Eli had last seen Jake on hospice.
Like we did this whole family energy thing, okay? And I reconnected with Jake. I mean, unbelievable.
You know, people find amazing coincidences happen after they go through this process. And, you know, I think I once asked, like, why'd you call me? He says, I don't know.
It was just, you know, it just felt like I should call. But once I reached out to Eli, he was like, can I come see you? And I'm like, yeah, totally.
Eli and Jake's two stepsisters, Sophie and Katie, drove to Western Massachusetts Hospital to visit Jake. And it was wild watching them come in.
And they just walked around the hall and I saw them come through the door. And I was in my chair.
Katie started crying right away. She was like crying.
And then we went into this like sunroom. They rolled me in there.
That's when Sophie kind of broke down, started crying. And they were like, we thought you were dead and i don't remember eli crying i remember eli being pretty just like taking all in kind of listening there were no questions more just like miss you love you it was it was a good visit it was a heavy.
So I didn't know any of this yet.

People were looking for me for a very long time.

He thought we just didn't want to be.

Didn't want to see him. Didn't want to deal with his dying and his illness.

That was what he thought.

Because that's what she was telling him, too.

Your family doesn't care.

Your family doesn't really love you.

I'm the only one. I love you.
I'll take care of you. You're my hubby.
Kind of stuff. You're my Jakey.
Yeah. Infuriating.
Jake's family, for the most part, had all been blocked by Ellen. They all relied on friends, or sometimes friends of friends, who were connected with Ellen on Facebook to give them updates.
My stepsister Katie, she like had this hunt of fine Jake. And one of Katie's friends, Mandy, was friends on Facebook with my wife.
And Katie and her would stalk her page for any insights to me. And that's when we learned, or my family learned, about Ellen, my wife, posting as me when I was on hospice.
So I'm locked in.

Can't move.

Can't do anything.

And she's posting as Jacob Handel on Facebook.

My wife is taking excellent care of me.

As if I was on a fucking beach in Maui.

Like, can't talk right now, guys.

I'm enjoying the surf.

Wife's, you know, posting as if I can post.

Which is, like, interesting and wild and crazy.

Jake Zanvarta was checking on Ellen's personal Facebook page,

which I believe has since been deactivated,

and she gained access to this via a friend's page.

She would go visit her friend in Framingham, Massachusetts, and then scroll through Ellen's recent posts. I felt like she was really going after, you know, the sympathy and going after how great I am at taking care of him stuff.
So posts were being made from Ellen's Facebook page about Jake and his medical journey, as well as from Jake's personal Facebook page, as if he himself was posting the updates. This started early.
She took control of my stuff two months after diagnosis. I mean, she took my phone when I could still use my phone, but the rationale then was, I don't want you to get drugs.
Jake was confused by this rationale, and he reminds me. There's nothing like, uh, you got six months to live to make you sober up.
She had everything, and I never got her back since. Jake had nothing.
But now, at least, he had some of his family back. When Eli visited him for the first time, Jake asked if he could come back again soon.
And he was like, yeah. And I was like, when you come back, can we dedicate some time for you helping me to write some things down? He was like, yeah.
Since being able to blink to communicate, Jake was having healthcare professionals write things for him. Diaries of what was happening in his life, memories from his medical journey so far, and it was a bit disorganized and scattered.
And Jake was hoping that Eli could help him transfer these notes to his iPad. And he was also hoping to have some dedicated writing time where he could dictate to Eli what he wanted to say and Eli could physically write it for him.
What I wanted to write down was huge and we went outside. It was like one of my first times outside.
This was like a week after that visit and we went outside to this like gazebo and he pushed me up there at the iPad and he was still having a hard time understanding what he was, and it took me like four or five times to get each word. Okay, and then he was, he broached the subject of my dad.
He was like, you should really, really contact your dad. And I'm like, but why? Jake wasn't ready to speak to his dad yet.
He was still confused about what he heard and experienced. And he just needed more time.
Eli suggested writing a letter to Derone. He would help Jake type it out.
He could say whatever he wanted to say. This, Jake agreed to.
It was along the lines of like, going through it a lot. Love you.
Always will. My dad.
Frustrated and don't know what to believe. And we will talk again just on now.
I commented to Jake about how meaningful this must have been to his dad. There was hope in the letter.
The door was nudged open.

Yeah, and I can honestly say at that juncture,

I put in that hope to be nice.

Man, so fucked up to say out loud.

Yeah, all right.

Internally, there wasn't hope yet. In that letter, I gave hope.
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When Jake wasn't journaling about his experience or attending countless and constant therapy sessions, he was attempting to connect with the outside world again. With his iPad, he made a new Facebook account.
I posted something in the LinkedIn Sudbury where I went to high school alumni page. And I was like, hi, Jacob Handel, class of 07.
Went through something crazy, but I'm alive now, recovering in Western. Like, I don't know.
I got like a hundred Facebook comments and then a lot of DMs and people reaching out. Not only from my high school, my first real girlfriend, Emma, she's like, Jake, you're live.
Like, amazing. I was so worried when I heard friends being like, I wanted to come visit, but I wasn't allowed.
And then Jake receives a message from an old friend via Facebook Messenger. And it catches his eye.
Great to see this post. Thought you were dead.
I was told I wasn't allowed to come to the funeral. And I'm like, huh? And I wrote him back, obviously, and I'm like, so where'd you get this idea at a funeral? I know it was expected, but it's like your wife made a post about the funeral and how drug addicts were not welcome, or anyone that has done a drug in their life.
One by one, people told Jake the same thing. They were shocked he was alive.
It was as if he had risen from the dead, someone they had already mourned. Even now, he still reconnects with old acquaintances who vividly remember the day they saw the Facebook post announcing his death.
He shows me a message he received just a few years ago that reads, Hi Jake, my brother told me he ran into you the other day and I asked him to say hi for me, but I figured I would reach out and say it myself. I have to admit that I started writing you a message after I saw a friend request from you because previously I thought you had passed.
Your, I'm assuming ex- Yeah. Jake's rose-colored glasses had shattered.
In time, the truth would unfold. But right now, he couldn't afford to get lost in it.
His focus had to be on recovery and getting out of his marriage. I actually grew to really like Western Mass State Hospital.
I knew everyone there. I started talking.
I was comfortable there. Dr.
Levinson, the one who first noticed movement in Jake's wrist, was still working with Jake. But Jake was in Western State Hospital, which was two hours away from Massachusetts General Hospital, which is where Dr.
Levinson worked. I would see him every three months, him and Dr.
Vanna, my neurologist, because the trip was so long and I'd have to be taken by a stretcher with a nurse. And like, it was just like a huge trip to make for an appointment.
Dr. Levinson wanted more regular updates on Jake's recovery.

The reason I started a YouTube channel,

I couldn't send Stephen Levinson and my care team in Boston

videos of my recovery because the files were too big

through text or email.

I was like, well, I could upload it to YouTube,

create a link, share, and no one's gonna like see it. I had like 25 YouTube followers and they were all doctors at MGH.
And it got to the point where they're like, you don't even need to send us a link, upload it, we'll see. And this is how everyone stayed in the loop for a while, but it just wasn't working.
So Dr. Levinson asked to schedule a call with Jake.
He's like, you need about 20 different consults, and bringing you out here for 20 different appointments doesn't make sense. You know, no one ever thought this would happen, but you've outgrown the therapy capabilities of Western Medical Hospital.
He was like, they've done an excellent job, but it's time to get you back into Spalding. And I'm like, I'm like, I thought you'd only get one shot at Spalding.
And I said that to him on the face call, and he's like, typically yes, but there are extreme circumstances where we can justify a second invasion stay. And he's like, I'm going to advocate for that, but you need to come back.
He's like, I'm going to have you live in Miss General for a while a while i'm super excited to go back hopefully the same staff is there because i can't wait to actually talk to him you know and yeah i was like sad to leave with some ass because i got a lot of friends My therapists were really amazing. But like everything in life, especially in the medical world, everything takes time.
And June passed by July. I'm kind of like eager to know what's going on.
And I remember my therapy team was like, it's all good. Like, you're going to keep getting better here.
So I stopped even thinking about it. And then it was July 24th, 4 o'clock in the afternoon, Levinson.
Jake, I have an ambulance transferring you by stretcher 810 tomorrow morning. Get packed up.
I'm like, damn. No notice, you know, out of the blue.
It's just how it goes. Jake transfers and is admitted to MGH.
This is where he'll stay until he's admitted to Tewkesbury State Hospital, which is where he'll live while receiving outpatient care from Spalding Rehabilitation Hospital. Western Mass State Hospital is calling me and telling me, and then Eli, who's now become like helping me manage everything, being like, yeah, we haven't received a single payment check in 15 months of you being here.

And you owe us like, like $20,000.

We're like, oh shit.

As healthcare proxy, Ellen had been receiving and handling all of the money.

Now Jake owed a lot of money, and the checks coming in through insurance

were not accessible to him. And those checks never made it into the hospital.
She's unwilling to sign anything, communicate. And Eli tried texting with her.
Oh, I have that text. Cool, calm, collective Eli writes out this thoughtful, rational text.
I made a response from her just being like, like, not fuck you, but, like, pretty much close to that. You know, it's like, well, so much for rational.
So I was like telling Levinson we need a lawyer because she's unwilling to communicate.

This should be my payment, and this payment is owed to hospitals.

Levinson's like, okay, there's this organization called Justice Bridge.

And Dr. Levinson connects Jake with a social worker who helps him get in contact with Justice Bridge.

About three months after the request was put in, Jake is connected with an attorney, Amy Clifford. My name is Amy Clifford, and I've had a law office, Clifford Law Office, since 2019.
But when I became a lawyer, I joined an incubator called Justice Bridge, And Justice Bridge connected new attorneys like me to low and moderate income individuals who are looking for legal representation. We provide that representation at reduced fee.
And we as new attorneys are able to provide that representation in an area we otherwise wouldn't be able to because we had a stable of 72 retired judges and experienced practitioners. So anytime we just came upon something that we thought was interesting and we could help out with, we were able to take that case because we had a team of experienced practitioners to rely on.
Amy was brought in to help Jake change his social security payee, a challenge since he had no ID, no belongings, and limited speech. Ensuring he could consent and prove that he was of sound mind added yet another layer of complication.
And at this point in time, Jake was receiving care from Tewkesbury State Hospital, just another hospital to add to his list of residencies. The rep payee for Social Security was Ellen, and I believe that she would not agree to sign to change that.
And so the net result was that I believe she was holding on to the Social Security payments. And so Tewkesbury Hospital wasn't getting like their portion of that that they should.
And it required me going in person to Tewkesbury Hospital. It was late in the evening.
It might have been like snowing or raining at the time. It was dark.
Jake didn't really have all the documentation. So he was just really stuck between a rock and a hard place and couldn't get anything.
So I was like super happy to be involved in the solution there

to establish a durable power of attorney so that like we could start getting things in order for himself. Amy questioned both Jake and Eli to confirm competence and then got all of the documents signed and notarized.
I felt really good. I was able to help somebody out and you know went on my very way.

And then Jake

retained me

to represent him

in his divorce.

You know, went on my very way. And then Jake retained me to represent him in his divorce.
You know, I'm always a romantic at heart. So I was like, I was like, are you sure you want to get a divorce? And, you know, and Jake had a very reasonable position, which is that, like, yes, I want to get a divorce.
Jake's request in the divorce seemed simple. He just wanted three things.
But that third thing turned what should have been a straightforward case into something far more unusual. The first request.
My personal belongings, mainly my mother's stuff. The second item on his list.

He wanted some photographs.

And finally, the third request.

My sperm, which was taken from me during lockdown syndrome. Thank you for listening to Blink.
This podcast is hosted and produced by me, Corinne Vienne, alongside my co-creator and survivor, Jake Handel. Our original music is composed by the brilliant and talented Michael Marget.
We're so grateful for your support. If you enjoyed this episode, please consider rating, reviewing, and sharing this story with others.
For additional resources, updates, and behind-the-scenes content, visit our website, BlinkThePodcast.com. Blink will return with a new episode April 13th.
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Legends with a Z.com is legendary fun.