Video 3 Never, ever give up

And then there are the crises. Of course there are.

And the vomiting starts, the seawater --you're not well. You're wearing a jellyfish mask for the ultimate protection.

It's difficult to swim in. It's causing abrasions on the inside of the mouth, but the tentacles can't get you.

And the hypothermia sets in. The water's 85 degrees, and yet you're losing weight and using calories.

And as you come over toward the side of the boat -- not allowed to touch it, not allowed to get out, but

Bonnie and her team hands me nutrition and ask me how I'm doing, am I all right. I am seeing the Taj Mahal --Over here.

I'm in a very different state -- And I'm thinking, "Wow! I never thought I'd be running into the Taj Mahal out here.

It's gorgeous! I mean, how long did it take them to build that? It's just ... So, uh -- wooo -- you know?

We kind of have a cardinal rule that I'm never told how far it is, because we don't know how far it is.

What's going to happen to you between this point and that point? What's going to happen to the weather and the currents

and, God forbid, you're stung, when you don't think you could be stung in all this armor.

Bonnie made a decision coming into that third morning that I was suffering, and I was hanging on by a thread.

And she said, "Come here," and I came close to the boat, and she said, "Look, look out there." And I saw light,

because the day is easier than the night, and I thought we were coming into day. I saw a stream of white light along the horizon,

and I said, "It's going to be morning soon."

And she said, "No, those are the lights of Key West."

It was 15 more hours, which for most swimmers would be a long time.

You have no idea how many 15-hour training swims I had done.

Questions

Why did Nyad see the Taj Mahal? 

>She was hallucinating.

If something is hanging by a thread, it is...

>in a risky and unstable situation.

It was 15 more hours, which for most swimmers would be a long time. You have no idea how many 15-hour training swims I had done

So here we go, and I somehow, without a decision, went into no counting of strokes and no singing and no quoting Stephen Hawking on the parameters of the universe.

I just went into thinking about this dream, and why and how.

As I said, when I turned 60, it wasn't about that concrete "Can you do it?"

That's the everyday machinations. That's the discipline, and it's the preparation, and there's a pride in that.

But I decided to think, as I went along, about -- you know, the phrase usually is, "reaching for the stars."And in my case, it's reaching for the horizon.

And when you reach for the horizon, as I've proven, you may not get there. But what a tremendous build of character and spirit that you lay down;

what a foundation you lay down in reaching for those horizons.

And now, the shore is coming. And there's just a little part of me that's sad.

The epic journey is going to be over.

So many people come up to me now and say,"What's next?"

"We love that!"."That little tracker on the computer? When are you going to do the next one? We can't wait to follow the next one."

Well, they were just there for 53 hours, and I was there for years.

And so there won't be another epic journey in the ocean.But the point is, and the point was, that every day of our lives is epic.

And I'll tell you, when I walked up onto that beach, staggered up onto that beach ...

I had so many times, in a very puffed-up ego way, rehearsed what I would say ...on the beach.

When Bonnie thought the back of my throat was swelling up,

she brought the medical team over to our boat to say, "you know...She's really beginning to have trouble breathing;

another 12, 24 hours in the saltwater..." -- the whole thing -- I just thought, in my hallucinatory moment,that I heard the word "tracheotomy."

Bonnie said to the doctor, "I'm not worried about her not breathing.

If she can't talk when she gets to the shore, she's going to be pissed off."

Questions

Why did Nyad feel a little bit sad when she is about reach the shore ? 

>The journey she had prepared for was about to end.

when you reach for the horizon, as I've proven, you may not get there. But what a tremendous build of character and spirit that you lay down;

If she can't talk when she gets to the shore, she's gonna be pissed off."

When Bonnie thought that the back of my throat was swelling up, she brought the medical team over to our boat to say that she's really beginning to have trouble breathing.