Sorry, this is really long.... I jut feel like sharing. If you don't feel like reading it, just aske me to sum it up. I love it so much better in her words though.
I was in an automobile accident in September of 1989, which totally changed my life. Chuck and I had just decided to step out by faith and put our two daughters in a Christian school, although we didn’t know exactly how we could afford it. Kimberly was going into the second grade and Stephanie was just entering kindergarten. After checking out Landmark, I told Chuck I just couldn’t drive that distance everyday – 2 times a day! It was an hour round trip on 295 and I was terrified of interstate driving! So, we decided to put them in a Christian school very close to where we lived. Then, on the second week of school, I found out that an accident could happen close to home also.
It had been a very busy day for me. I had taken the girls to school, and later that morning, went to church to practice with a lady who sang specials. Time got away from me and I was there much longer than I had planned. I still needed to go to the grocery store before picking up the girls from school. After rushing through the store, I was doing fine, but if I went on to school from the store, my cold foods would get warm while waiting in the car line. It was a very hot September day, so I decided it would be better if I ran the groceries home and put them in the air condition house. I could put them away when I got home. There was only one problem with this plan – I didn’t make it home from school that day. In fact, I didn’t even make it to school!
This was during the time that Hungry Road was being widened from 2 lanes to 4. With all the construction delays, I found it was faster to go the back roads to school. However, this involved going across Staples Mills Road at a place where it widens from 2 lanes to 4 – without a stoplight! I remember pulling up to Staple Mills and looking both ways. To my left, there was nothing coming. To my right, there was a car, but it wasn’t that close or going that fast. As I pulled across the first 2 lanes, I heard a tractor-trailer truck rush its motor. I remember looking across at it and wondering what it was doing on these back roads. I looked to my right again as I continued crossing and I remember seeing a vehicle fly around the car I thought I had time to cross in front of. The driver of the tractor-trailer had been trying to warn me. It all happened so fast! My van was hit at the side door – right where the girls would have been if the had been with me. Thank the Lord they weren’t! My van then hit the tractor-trailer and went off the road. The Lord is so good because I don’t remember anything after this, except for thinking or saying (I’m not sure which) "Oh no, I’m going to end up in the hospital. I hate hospitals!" The next three weeks I have no memory of.
When Chuck got home from work that evening, he didn’t know where I was or why the groceries – even the cold foods – were sitting in the kitchen still in bags. As he sat wondering, the doorbell rang. It was a policeman who told him that I had been in an accident and hurt very badly. I was at St. Mary’s hospital - "But what about the girls?" he asked. The policeman told him I was the only one in the car. "Where are the girls?" he wondered. Right after that, Dreama Fuson called to tell him that she had the girls. She was my emergency number and when I didn’t show up by 5 o’clock, the school had called her.
When Chuck got to the hospital, the doctors weren’t very optimistic. I was semi-conscious. They told him that I probably wouldn’t live through the night and, it would probably be better if I didn’t because more than likely, I would be a vegetable for the rest of my life. Wow! If I lived, they said it would probably take a year before they would even know how much I would recover.
Here Chuck stood – His wife probably wouldn’t live through the night or be a vegetable if she did. He had two young daughters, which needed their mommy. He began to pray, and then he called my family and his family to get them and their churches to pray, and they called their friends and families. Soon, many people were praying for me, people all over the United States. Some of the ladies in our church spent the whole night praying for me, and our families drove straight down from West Virginia arriving in the wee hours of the morning.
I had no broken bones, but I was soon black and blue with bruises. I was wearing my seat belt, which probably helped to save my life. However, the jolt of the accident caused me to suffer a brain injury. The hospital had to shave my head on one side and drill a hole in my skull to relieve the pressure caused from my brain swelling. – And yes, in case you are wondering, I DO have a brain! This was proof!
The first three weeks were very critical – but Chuck was there for me. During this time God gave him a peace in his heart that everything was going to be all right and Romans 8:28 became his favorite Bible verse. The nurses and doctors told Chuck that it helped for my family to talk to me even if I wasn’t responding. My mom told me later that she couldn’t stand to come in to see me with Chuck because it broke her heart to hear him talk to me and tell me how much he and the girls loved me and needed me to get well.
After three weeks, I had improved enough to be taken to Sheltering Arms Hospital to begin therapy. But then, in addition to everything else Chuck received a phone call in the middle of the night. Blood clots had developed in my legs and some of them had gone to my lungs. Things were critical again for a while. But later therapy started, and at age 31, I had to learn to do all those wonderful things that a baby learns! Things we do every-day without even thinking, such a feeding ourselves. Although my mouth is big, I still had trouble hitting it with food! I may hit my forehead, or who knows what! Another thing I had to learn to do, as an adult was to walk! The floor seemed a lot farther away for an adult than it is for a one-year-old! When they first got me up to walk between two polls that looked like parallel bars gymnast use, I begged to have my wheelchair back. My legs wouldn’t move. But as time went on, and after much exercising and stationary bike riding, I could walk with a walker. Later, I learned to walk up and down stair holding on to the rails. At that time we lived in a two-story house with all the bedrooms upstairs, so this was important.
The brain injury not only effected my coordination, and motor skill, but also, my memory. After I learned to maneuver a wheelchair, I would leave my room to go exploring in the hall. There was only one problem with this – I would forget what room to go back to. I would go into someone else’s room and accuse them of being in my bed. The nurses soon learned that when I was in a wheelchair, to tape a card with my room number on it to my skirt tail. That way I could find my way back to the right room. My memory was so terrible that I could eat lunch and after they took the tray away, I couldn’t remember if I had ate, much less what I had eaten. Chuck would come to see me in the evenings and I would tell him that no one had been there all day. But, when he got home, someone would call him to tell him they had come. Then they would tell him something funny I had done, or something funny I had made them do!
On the weekends I was allowed to come home, and things I used to do without even thinking, I couldn’t do. Even the smallest things, such a walking to the bathroom! Every time I needed to go, Chuck had to walk me there and wait to walk me back. I had to be helped in and out of the bathtub. Every time I went up stairs Chuck had to walk behind me, and when I came down he had to walk in front of me to catch me if I lost my balance. At bedtime he would pile pillows and sleeping bags high at the foot of the bed to elevate my legs to reduce the swelling. In the middle of the night I would often stretch, pointing my toes, which caused terrible pain and cramps. Chuck would always wake up and rub my legs until the cramp went away. He took care of me like I was his baby. The Lord has blessed me with a wonderful husband. He loved and nursed me back to health!
During the time I was in the hospital, Chuck had to make some important decisions at work. Decisions he had to make alone because he wasn’t able to talk them over with me. His company was offering lay-off packages and with the years he had with the company, if he had taken the lay-off offer, he could have received a year’s pay. – A year he could have spent helping me recover, he thought, but at the end would involve moving somewhere else to live and work. He didn’t know if I could adjust to the move, so he took a cut in his position to stay in Richmond. He thought that was best for me. After three weeks at Sheltering Arms Hospital, I got to go home. However, I still had a long way to go and so I had to go to therapy every day.
While I was in the hospital and therapy, Chuck’s parents and my parents spent a lot of time in Richmond helping out. However, some weeks, Chuck was on his own. Not only did he have to fix lunches and cook for the girls, but also, help with their homework. And then, there was his favorite thing – fixing their hair of the morning! Some mornings they would go to school and ask their teacher to fix it. But, after I got out of the hospital, they would get up early before I left for therapy so I could do it. Fixing little girl’s hair just wasn’t Chuck’s thing!
As time went on, and therapy continued, I could walk with a walker, then a prong cane, and finally a regular cane. However, the cane was my security blanket that I did not want to give up. Finally, they told me I could have it for just one more week because I didn’t need it. During that week I was quite comical because I would walk through the therapy center holding it tightly – but with it raised a foot off the floor! I wasn’t using it, but I had it just in case I needed it. I was preparing myself for when they would take it from me!
While at the therapy center, the Lord showed me how much we really have to be thankful for. Some of the people there were just pitiful to see. Some had had strokes that affected them much like my head injury affected me, but others were much worse. I don’t remember the names of anyone there, but I can remember their circumstances. One boy was only 19 years old and had been in a terrible motor cycle accident. Before the accident, he was engaged, but his fiancé couldn’t cope with the way he was now. He couldn’t even talk – but I remember his sad eyes. Believe me, we all take a lot for granted.
In addition to the physical therapy I had to go through, they had to deal with my loss of memory. Part of the day I would spend playing computer memory games. Even at the beginners’ level, I would become frustrated. Also, they would often question me about computers because I had some important church records stored on our computer and no one knew exactly how I had them stored. Many were praying that I would remember by the end of the year when they would need these records.
A lot of household duties I had to find new ways of doing. I could walk across the room and forget what I went for. I found that if I said things out loud and heard it, I could remember it much better. I also learned to set timers especially when I was cooking so I wouldn’t burn everything – I still have to do this today although at times, I still treat Chuck as a god and give him burnt offerings! When I first started cooking again I would spend most of my time just looking for things because I couldn’t remember where I had put them away. In addition to that, I was still on blood thinner and my coordination wasn’t good so I wasn’t supposed to use a knife. Try cooking without using a knife – it’s not easy! Even after my coordination improved, I still struggled with my memory. I remember trying to crochet again, my hands were able but my memory wasn’t. I could read just one line of directions, but I couldn’t remember it long enough to do it. Crocheting and cross-stitching became my therapy- they both helped my coordination and my memory.
Before the doctors would release me to drive again, I had to go through a driving course at the therapy center. The doctor wanted to make sure my head injury didn’t effect my judgement. Then, after 4 months in the hospital and therapy, I was finally released, but I still had a long road ahead of me. My memory was much better now, but for some reason, I didn’t remember how to get around and go places. On the weekends, when Chuck and I were out, I would see stores that I had always gone to and it was like seeing them for the first time. I had lived at the grocery store and the fabric store, but now, I didn’t remember where they were or how to get to them. It was like being in a new city and discovering where everything is!
Chuck would encourage me to go out for drives during the daytime just to get me out of the house and back to my normal self. Anytime I went out, there were three things I made sure I had just in case I got lost. One was Chuck’s phone number at work. I also had the phone number of a man that worked with Chuck that we were friends with – just in case Chuck wasn’t in his office. And, a city map. Several times I had to get the map out, but I never had to call him to get home. I also had to learn my license number because when I came out of a store, even after just a short time, I couldn’t remember where I had parked. I never knew there were so many mini-vans in Richmond!
I remember one week right after I got out of therapy, when I guess I was having a pity-party. All week, I kept praying over and over again asking God "Why? Why had this happened to me?" I wanted to know why because I really didn’t want to go through this again! Every time I would pray – Roman 8:28 would come to my mind. All week long I moped around and kept praying, "Why, Lord?’ The answer was always Romans 8:28. I had always heard preachers say that when you are going through trials, that it was God trying to get your attention. Well, He had my attention, but why was my answer always Roman 8:28? The next Sunday, God gave the preacher a message just for me. He preached about how God sends trials into our lives sometimes to make us stronger and to trust Him more. - Not always because we have disobeyed Him. I’m a slow learner, but when I finally quit mopping and asking "Why?" and started thinking about Roman 8:28, I could see a lot of good things which had come as a result of my accident. Our family was definitely drawn closer to each other and to God. My girls saw first hand what prayer can do. We also saw the importance of having our children in a Christian school, which cared for them and worked with them during this time. The girls’ classmates made cards and prayed daily for me. (I still have all these cards!) There are many other things that I learned also, like – not to take even the little things for granted, and not to rush through life but to slow down. And, I saw how much I was loved and what a wonderful family the Lord has given me! A preacher friend of ours told Chuck that he was going through "wife appreciation time" – but I think it was "husband appreciation" time for me, too. It was through this time that I saw how much I was loved by the way he was always there for me and the way he took care of me
Now, when I do things that are just normal everyday activities, I sometimes have to just stop and thank God. I have to thank Him because I can do these things. There are so many things I couldn’t do today if God hadn’t helped me. We ALL have so much to be thankful for. There are many things that I had to learn to do again and I don’t want to ever take them for granted. Things such as playing the piano. I took piano lessons again, along with Kimberly, and although I still can’t play great, I’ve come along way. However, my hands and brain still have problems working together! And then, there is sewing. With the Lord’s help, I have been able to make dresses for all the important events in my girls’ life. I started with Stephanie’s kindergarten graduation dress. Then, every year I would make their Easter dresses and later, I was able to make Kimberly’s homecoming dresses. Later, I made Stephanie’s high school graduation dress. I couldn’t have done it without the Lord’s help.
Then, there are those things, which involve my memory – like teaching a Sunday school class. I am so thankful for the opportunity! Wow! With the Lord’s help, and lot of prayer, I can! "I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me" (Phil. 4: 13)
When the pastor first asked me about teaching, I told him I would pray about it, and I did. However, I prayed, "But, Lord . . ." as I tried to talk Him out of it. God used a chorus I was singing one day to show me I just needed to say "Yes". The song said, "Yes, Lord, yes, to Your Will and to Your Way. Yes, Lord, yes, I will trust You and obey. . ." I wasn’t really trusting the Lord, was I? I wasn’t happy until I said, "Yes."
There are several songs that Chuck and I used to sing before the accident, which now have a new meaning to us. We would sing, "Learning to Lean" – but did we really know what it meant to lean on Jesus? We do now! And other songs like, "Thank you Lord, for Your Blessings on Me." Not only do we have "a roof up above us" and "a good place to sleep. There’s food on our table" (We can feed ourselves that food!) "And shoes on our feet" (Our feet which can move and walk!) How often do we thank God for this? God "gave me His love, and a fine family," a wonderful family! "Thank you, Lord. For Your blessings on me"!
Several years after my accident, I was visiting a friend in Alabama, which introduced me to a lady in her church who instantly remembered me because she had prayed for me. The same thing happened in West Virginia when my mother-in-law started to introduce me to a lady in her church. "This is my daughter-in-law Kathey, she . . ." that was as far a she got when the lady looked at me and said, "I know, I prayed for you." It is such a humbling but blessed feeling to know that others prayed for me. People that didn’t even know me - prayed for me. They prayed earnestly because years later they still remembered praying and even remembered my name! I still tear up today when I think about all those who prayed for me. I’m so glad that God hears and answers prayers.
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