Clothier Campaign

On the afternoon of June 30th a tragic event happened to our family. Our step-dad Barry Clothier had come home from golfing with co-workers and was not feeling well. My brother, Greg, ended up having to call 911 and our step dad had ended up getting flown out to UMD Shock Trauma center for what they thought was a stroke. My brother, mother and I ended up driving out to meet them at the hospital that afternoon. It was a long evening for our whole family. Not only for my mother, brother and I, but my sister-in-law Shelly, my Fiance' Josh, the 5 grandchildren, and our Jeannie (his wife) and Barry's immediate families.

There has been so much waiting in the hospital room for family, friends, and co-workers of Barry. As of today, July 2nd,  this is what we know. Barry had a blockage in one of the arteries on the right side of his neck. Something happened to dislocate a piece of that blockage that lead it into his right brain, which caused the stroke. Yesterday he had a full scan of his heart and a full MRI. His heart looked good, but his MRI was a different story. It seemed as if he had a lot more damage to his right brain, from the stroke, than we had origionally thought. This has lead to poralysis on his left side and eventually will cause significant swelling within the brain. Our mom has been at the hospital since Thursday, not leaving his side. I was able to convince her to come home, to the Eastern Shore, last night to get some rest because the doctors are telling us this will be a long recovery. As of 3:15 this morning, mom recieved a phone call that our step father had taken a turn for the worse and was having significant swelling in his brain already. As of 7:45 this morning, they had taken him to get a piece of of his bone removed in his skull, called a Craniotomy. This is to help with swelling in his brain so that it has room to heal. As of  10:00 Barry (or Pappy as the grandkids call him) was finished with his surgery and did very well. As of now he is not awake and has a drainage tube.

What does this mean for the long term? As of right now, if all goes well, he will have a long road of PT, OT and Speech. Eventually, being transfurred to a rehabilitation center.

This is where we need our wonderful communities help.  Barry should have time saved up to use right now for the days of work he misses. At this point we are not sure how much time he has saved up yet but, he works as the Deputy Engineer for the Bay Bridge and we have been keeping in touch closely with his boss and will figure out those details. That being said, my mom on the other hand only gets paid while she works and is an hourly employee. She will have may expenses to pay and eventually with no means to pay them if she does not work. If this were anyone close to you in the hospital for this situation, we would all want to be by their side as much as possible to help the recovery process.

At this point my brother, sister-in-law, Josh and I will be paying for a hotel room, so she can get adequate rest and be able to take care of her ownself to help her husbands long recovery down the road. She will also have medical exspenses, food expenses while supporting his recovery and other personal expenses.

As their closest family memebers we are asking for any amount of donation to help this wonderful family, who has given back to us SO MUCH within their lifetime. We could go on and on about how wonderful Jeannie and Barry are and how much they deserve all the happiness in the world. Please consider helping and we will keep updates on progress.