DeJuan's Road to Recovery
Donation protected
Hello everyone,
My name is Crystal Thompson and I want to tell you about and awesome husband and father. His name is DeJuan Thompson.
On October 17, 2017, my world and the lives of my children were forever changed. It started off like any other day. It was my husband's turn to take our four children to school. He made it back home at 8 a.m. sharp coming in to the house to make some breakfast and watching a little t.v. as I slept. I finally awoke hours later and made my way to the kitchen to get some food myself. Through out the day we chatted about life and the stress we were going through trying to work on getting back on our feet after having such a rough year with the loss of his mother earlier in the year. It was still a very raw and emotional time for him as he tried to continue life in her absence.
Around 4 p.m my husband started to complain about having a really bad headache (You see he suffers from high blood pressure). After hearing him say this, I realized that he had been complaining about headaches quite frequently over the past two weeks. I suggested he go to the hospital or we could go get a refill of one of his medications. We had been having some financial hardship and could not afford all of his medications. So he decided to just try and get a partial refill on one of his prescriptions.
So we did just that. I took my last $7 and got 10 pills of the partial refill. We got home and he took two and still was in a lot of pain so I gave him an over the counter headache medication.
Within hours my husband had collapsed on the floor and was being rushed to the emergency room. It was at this time that I was told my husband, my mate of 21 years, father of 5 beautiful children, and my best friend since 5th grade, had a bleed in the brain stem part of his brain. I was devastated to say the least. These types of bleeds control breathing, heart rate, temperature, and blood pressue. It is the central area of the brain where all signals travel from the upper portion of the brain down through the spinal cord to tell the body what to do, and it was hemorrhaging as he was having a stroke.
I would not know if I would ever see my husband alive after this moment. I was struck with disbelief. I was confused, hurt, and scared. How could this happen? We were just at home, try to mend our lives back together. But now I was having to face the reality that I might be a widow and mother of 5 children after that night.
Well, God saw fit to keep my husband here, but not without complications. He was in a coma and unresponsive for over 3 weeks. Due to him not being able to protect his own air way, a tracheotomy was preformed and he was on a breathing machine. Due to not being able to eat, a feeding tube was placed in his stomach, which he still has both.
Every day since that day in October, I never left my husband's side. I was there every day and every night. I wanted to make sure I was there when he woke up. I was not able to return to work due to this. After some time he finally opened his eyes. Doctors did not expect any change in his condition. They were not sure if he would make it or not and to what extent. They said he had a condition called Locked-In Syndrome, where you are awake inside but unable to communicate with the outside world. They talked to me about alternatives, like placing him in a nursing home setting or hospice care. I refused to place my husband into a facility, where I know from experience of working at several of these types of facilities, it's not the best place to be. I wanted to take my husband home to be surround by his wife and children, not in some strange place surrouded by strangers.
So I fought hard for him and worked with him everyday to get him ready for home. After being in the hospital's ICU for two months and two days, my husband had worked himself off of the breathing machine during this time and was breathing the same air you and I breath. He had done so for over two and a half week and we were scheduled to finally head home. On December 19th 2017 he was released for the hospital.
He is unable to talk or walk, or move his arms or hold my hand or control his head as of yet, but I am working with him to get him as much rehabilitation as I can. He has started to push his feet against my hands as I push back against him. He is trying to squeeze my hand and is able to swollow. He can track a person with his eyes as long as they are in his view. He has a long way to go but yet he has come so far as well.
I am asking for anyone who can help us to please do so. I desperately, want to return to work so that I can help provide for my family but without the assistance of a CNA, it is proven to be hard. We are on the verge of losing everthing that we have tried so hard to build back up.
If you can find it in your heart to donate what you can, it will help with getting the supplies that I may need that are not covered by his insurance, paying household bills and help with getting him back to as much of himself as possible. Your generosity would have helped a great man and his family in their time of need.
Thank you,
Signed his wife,
Crystal Thompson.
My name is Crystal Thompson and I want to tell you about and awesome husband and father. His name is DeJuan Thompson.
On October 17, 2017, my world and the lives of my children were forever changed. It started off like any other day. It was my husband's turn to take our four children to school. He made it back home at 8 a.m. sharp coming in to the house to make some breakfast and watching a little t.v. as I slept. I finally awoke hours later and made my way to the kitchen to get some food myself. Through out the day we chatted about life and the stress we were going through trying to work on getting back on our feet after having such a rough year with the loss of his mother earlier in the year. It was still a very raw and emotional time for him as he tried to continue life in her absence.
Around 4 p.m my husband started to complain about having a really bad headache (You see he suffers from high blood pressure). After hearing him say this, I realized that he had been complaining about headaches quite frequently over the past two weeks. I suggested he go to the hospital or we could go get a refill of one of his medications. We had been having some financial hardship and could not afford all of his medications. So he decided to just try and get a partial refill on one of his prescriptions.
So we did just that. I took my last $7 and got 10 pills of the partial refill. We got home and he took two and still was in a lot of pain so I gave him an over the counter headache medication.
Within hours my husband had collapsed on the floor and was being rushed to the emergency room. It was at this time that I was told my husband, my mate of 21 years, father of 5 beautiful children, and my best friend since 5th grade, had a bleed in the brain stem part of his brain. I was devastated to say the least. These types of bleeds control breathing, heart rate, temperature, and blood pressue. It is the central area of the brain where all signals travel from the upper portion of the brain down through the spinal cord to tell the body what to do, and it was hemorrhaging as he was having a stroke.
I would not know if I would ever see my husband alive after this moment. I was struck with disbelief. I was confused, hurt, and scared. How could this happen? We were just at home, try to mend our lives back together. But now I was having to face the reality that I might be a widow and mother of 5 children after that night.
Well, God saw fit to keep my husband here, but not without complications. He was in a coma and unresponsive for over 3 weeks. Due to him not being able to protect his own air way, a tracheotomy was preformed and he was on a breathing machine. Due to not being able to eat, a feeding tube was placed in his stomach, which he still has both.
Every day since that day in October, I never left my husband's side. I was there every day and every night. I wanted to make sure I was there when he woke up. I was not able to return to work due to this. After some time he finally opened his eyes. Doctors did not expect any change in his condition. They were not sure if he would make it or not and to what extent. They said he had a condition called Locked-In Syndrome, where you are awake inside but unable to communicate with the outside world. They talked to me about alternatives, like placing him in a nursing home setting or hospice care. I refused to place my husband into a facility, where I know from experience of working at several of these types of facilities, it's not the best place to be. I wanted to take my husband home to be surround by his wife and children, not in some strange place surrouded by strangers.
So I fought hard for him and worked with him everyday to get him ready for home. After being in the hospital's ICU for two months and two days, my husband had worked himself off of the breathing machine during this time and was breathing the same air you and I breath. He had done so for over two and a half week and we were scheduled to finally head home. On December 19th 2017 he was released for the hospital.
He is unable to talk or walk, or move his arms or hold my hand or control his head as of yet, but I am working with him to get him as much rehabilitation as I can. He has started to push his feet against my hands as I push back against him. He is trying to squeeze my hand and is able to swollow. He can track a person with his eyes as long as they are in his view. He has a long way to go but yet he has come so far as well.
I am asking for anyone who can help us to please do so. I desperately, want to return to work so that I can help provide for my family but without the assistance of a CNA, it is proven to be hard. We are on the verge of losing everthing that we have tried so hard to build back up.
If you can find it in your heart to donate what you can, it will help with getting the supplies that I may need that are not covered by his insurance, paying household bills and help with getting him back to as much of himself as possible. Your generosity would have helped a great man and his family in their time of need.
Thank you,
Signed his wife,
Crystal Thompson.
Organizer
Crystal R Thompson
Organizer
Loganville, GA
