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| Our family at Jenny's graduation the year before the injury |
Steven:
One minute, I was a normal 47-year-old father with four wonderful children, taking a leisurely ride in the country with my wife Vicki. The next minute, I was trapped in a vehicle that would take the “jaws of life” two hours to untangle before Vicki and I could be removed from the wreckage. I was in a coma that would lead to severe traumatic brain injury, and would forever change every facet of my life.
Vicki:
Three days after the collision, I started coming around enough to realize that I was in a hospital, very badly injured (with a collapsed lung, 9 broken bones, extensive internal injuries, and deep lacerations). They told me that Steven might not make it. If he did live, they didn’t know if he would ever come out of the coma or what kind of horrible disabilities he might end up with. In addition, I had a strong potential of multiple lawsuits against me from the 8 teenagers riding in the pickup truck we collided with; we could be facing financial ruin. Grief, anxiety, fear, and despair enveloped and threatened to overwhelm me.
Years before, I had given my life to Jesus Christ, and ever since that time, He has been my best friend. So in this hour of intense agony, I cried out to God. He took me to Psalm 62 in His Word....“Find rest, oh my soul, in God alone; my hope comes from Him. He alone is my rock and my salvation; I shall not be shaken.” An unexplainable peace filled me as God assured me that HE ALONE was enough to sustain me through all things ahead.
Steven:
After the collision, it took about three months to gradually come out of the coma. You might think that I saw, felt, or heard nothing, but the opposite was true. The first indication I got that something had changed was an awareness of being in bed. All of a sudden, the walls, bedclothes and everything turned sort of red - like the colors of a rainbow, only much more brilliant and beautiful. I asked myself, “What’s going on here?” I knew something was different. Then I heard a voice that I didn’t recognize. I can’t find the words that would describe it - only that it was gentle, like a mother talking the first time to her newborn infant, but softer and gentler. The voice kept saying the same thing, over and over and over again, every night and day. What did it say? “Steven, I love you. Steven, I love you. Steven, I love you.” I recognized that it was God; no human has a voice like that. I didn’t question or answer back - I couldn’t. But I was filled with a deep and total peace.
Vicki:
Steven was transferred 3 hours away to the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago. The first time we saw each other in Chicago, Steven didn’t remember that I was his wife, nor did I recognize him. He was a different person - not only physically altered but, as I found out months later, even his personality had changed.
We were told that he would never talk again because of extensive injury to the left temporal, parietal, and frontal lobes of the brain. However, God had different plans. I was at home the day the doctor first “capped” his trachea. I got a call from his nurse saying, “Somebody wants to talk to you.” Then a voice came on the line saying, in just barely understandable words, “Hi Honey. I love you.”
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| Learning how to walk again |
Steven:
When I came out of the coma, I had to face what I had lost. No longer would I be a physician, treating patients in my Chiropractic clinic. Instead, I found myself in a Chicago hospital, without Vicki, unable to do anything. I had to work very hard to slowly bring back movement for every muscle in my body, a discouraging, monumental task. It took months of intensive therapy to get rid of my g-tube and learn to swallow and eat again, to sit and stand up on my own and start to use a walker. I had to relearn the alphabet and train myself to read again. But an even more difficult task was relearning how to reason and organize the intelligent thoughts that my mind still contained. For a long time, I was very angry at God, because it seemed He was punishing me. I asked God “why ME?” I was given the answer to that question only when God knew I was ready to really hear it. That day, God took me to the book of Job in the Bible.... Job, in one day, lost all his earthly possessions, his 10 children, and his health. He was covered with painful boils from the top of his head to the bottom of his feet… thousands of years before the days of pain medications and antibiotics. All he could do was sit (on boils) and suffer. Job (like me) asked God “why ME”? God said, “I shall question YOU; you will answer ME..... Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundation? Tell me if you understand! Who marks off its dimensions? Surely you know! Who strung a measuring line across it?” God asks Job question after question for four chapters in the Bible.
I went to college for seven years, but of all the questions God asked Job, I couldn’t answer even one. What I learned is that some knowledge is beyond our human understanding.....too involved and too complex for us to see the whole picture. But, there are reasons for everything God allows. I have to trust God - not my own understanding.
Vicki:
As the years have gone by since the collision, Steven has faced continued health problems, including a stroke, Parkinson’s Disease, seizures, and, now, the originally rejuvenated neurons are dying out (creating further extensive disability). Yet through it all, the knowledge that we can trust our loving Heavenly Father has given us hope and strength to endure with joy.
Steven:
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| Steven with his prayer notebook |
Steven and Vicki:
Perhaps you are facing a dark valley right now. Just as He did for us, God is waiting to show you His love personally. In fact, He loves you so much that He gave up His most valued possession, His Son Jesus, to die in your place for the wrongs you have done. (“Christ died for our sins, He was buried, He was raised on the third day, according to the Scriptures” I Co. 15:3).
Because of this free gift, you can now have a personal relationship with the Heavenly Father who made you. (“I will be a Father to you, and you will be my sons and daughters” 2 Co. 6:18). All you need to do is admit that your sins and unbelief in Christ separate you from God (“For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” Rom. 3:23). Then, accept the free gift of His Son as the only way to be right with God.
For more information, please visit:
Steve and Vicki,
ReplyDeleteYou have lots of us in Eureka praying for you. Steve, remember the Resurrection, made possible because our Father sent His son for us. It will not always be as it is now. Keep your eyes on Jesus. He will see you through.
Love, Genny