September 2005

I found this email from Jo and have been meaning to blog it…it’s from May 2:

I got a chance to see both URex and ADonna yesterday and wanted to report.

I was quite prepared for URex to be really “bad off.” I must tell you he was not what I expected. He talked not as easily as usual, but didn’t seem to be at a loss for stuff to say. For example, after Papa climbed up on a chair to fix the vertical blinds since the control thingys were broken, UR asked what Papa was doing on Monday. Of course Papa said “Nothing … what do you need?” UR asked “Can you drive?” P said “Yes.” UR said “What time can you be here?” P said “Whenever you need me.” After a pause, UR said “Well, I’m not sure yet when those blinds are gonna need to be turned the other way yet, I’ll let you know.” = )

He commented that “they” say the “wagon” caused the accident. I was glad and hope he believes it. He joked about how the owner of the wagon hasn’t been heard from and maybe it’s because he fears UR is gonna sue. Papa said he heard the owner is gonna sue UR for damage to the wagon! UR laughed easily and said that would make sense.

He also talked about wanting some gumbo from the Jambalaya Shoppe on Perkins, not the one on Old Hammond because that one has been sold to somebody outside the family and their gumbo isn’t as good. He ate while we were there but it wasn’t much. Mama fed him but later when I saw Becki she was saying how he could eat on his own.

Physically, he’s got a MAJOR neck brace. It keeps his chin up (higher than looks comfortable) and also prevents his head from turning right or left.

He said all staples have been removed and he kept them (!) if you care to see ’em. His left arm is being held at a 90 degree angle to his waist and he doesn’t move it at all … that’s the broken collarbone. The skin on his left shoulder looked smooth but dark. I didn’t see the back of his shoulder. His right arm is still yellow from bruising, his fingers are pretty rough around the nails, maybe from road burn. It’s just spots here and there that are torn up and the nails are grungy around the edges. I seem to remember that the gloves he wore were fingerless, so that might explain the fingers. He’s had a staple in his right leg, below the knee.

The staple is gone and the wound just had a couple of bandaids. The left leg has a good size cast just below the knee to the toes. Becki says he stood on his own without support yesterday, so that’s improvement. He coughs a lot. Mama says it’s because he’s not moving much and it just collects in his chest. He has breathing treatments to “bring it up and out” but he was saying how he has to concentrate to really get it out.

He said all they needed to do was tell him what they needed to see to let him go home and he’ll do it. His first day of therapy in LA is today.

ADonna, on the other hand, looked just like her same old self. She showed up at Kyle’s birthday party, which was held at First Bapt Gonz after their church service last night. (He was 1 year old yesterday!) Amy, Sam, Bek, Heidi, Caleb and Kelsey were with her. (quite an entourage) AD was in a wheelchair and had long sleeves and pants, bandaids on her fingers. So really, all you could see was her head but it looks like always. = ) I just cheek-to-cheeked her for fear of touching her anywhere.

Ronnie, Josh and other folks built a ramp at UD’s house and Bek says it’s great. Apparently they’re going to need it. AD is home now and UR said he expected he might be at HealthSouth Rehab for a few weeks.

They both still have a lot of healing to do. Keep them in your prayers.

I still haven’t blogged anything about UR and AD’s motorcycle accident; so here it is abbreviated: April 16th they were in Florida on their bike pulling a small trailer they’d borrowed from her brother when UR lost control. It’s still debated whether the wind lifted up the trailer or it started wobbling because of the treads worn in the road (the trailer’s not as wide as a car and perhaps it started shimmying going in and out of the treads on the road). UR doesn’t remember what happened except for telling AD that he didn’t think he could control it. The person in the car behind them stopped and helped them get out of the road…so we know that no one hit them.

Anyway…Kel had been here for the weekend and was getting ready to leave when we got a call from Jo saying that they’d been in an accident and it didn’t look like they were gonna make it! Oh, what feelings run through you when you hear that someone so close to you is going to die. I couldn’t imagine how Bec and Sam must be feeling. I just kept thinking how odd it was for them to lose their parents…they’re only about 30. I guess it was selfish to think of them and not AD and UR. I think I was just comparing them to myself. I can’t imagine losing my parents…we all seem so young! Well, Kel and I didn’t really know what to do so after a minute I called Bec and left a message saying I’d do anything she wanted me to do…go up there and keep her kids, keep them here…go with them to Florida and keep them…anything she needed. She called me later and said the kids had already gone to a church friend’s house and Bec and Sam were flying to Fla. Every time I talked to Bec during this time she was so calm. It was just like we were talking about making a cake…she never sounded upset. I really admire how calm she always is…even in everyday life with her kids. I don’t remember how long it was before we found out that UR and AD were gonna pull through…I guess it was that same day. The next morning I mentioned them in Sunday School and I’m pretty sure we were sure they were gonna live…we just didn’t know how well off they’d be.

Looking at my notes UR had two fractured vertebrae and they had to fuse his neck bones together. AD had a ruptured spleen, and had broken all on her left side her clavicle, collarbone, shoulder blade, almost if not all of her ribs and maybe her hip, and she had a kidney removed. For a while they thought that she might have fluid in her lungs so she had a chest tube inserted. In spite of the fact that I have so much on AD and so little on UR she recovered very quickly. She’s been walking around for a good while now and went home by herself a couple of weeks before UR. She seems 99% back to normal now. UR took a good bit longer to recover…I think the extreme blow to his brain is what really put him out of commission. He was in a lot of therapy and then in a wheelchair with his neck in a brace. They stayed in Florida for a month or so and then were helicoptered to La. For a while there at the beginning he was having memory problems…every day people would have to tell him again what had happened. And his voice was strange…he was without inflection so talking to him (especially over the phone) was uncomfortable. It just seemed like he had no emotion about anything so I kept wondering if I should just get off the phone. Early on in the hospital he told Sam “I never meant to hurt your Mama.” I can’t imagine hearing those words from my father…I would surely break down and cry. He’s recovered so well now, too. He’s not 100%, he walks kinda gingerly and just seems a little frail, but compared to where he started it’s amazing! Mom said that his helmet has a two inch split in it at the top of his head! He had a cut on his head but I don’t think his skull was fractured. It was amazing to me how many churches were praying for them: ours, Bec/Jason’s, Mom/Papa’s, Jo’s, Kel’s, theirs, there were churches in Florida who visited them and prayed for them…that’s seven right there and who knows how many more there were!? God has been so good to our family.

They’ve both been home now for several months and have made a trip or two up here to Bec’s. I think they just keep getting better. You can hardly tell that anything happened to AD, and I think UR will reach that point in the not too distant future!

Mom emailed me that Uncle Bobby got saved today!