5. The Power of Mothers’ Prayers
Lying there in the dark, I felt exceptionally peaceful and confident. I had been promoted to a new position which I was prepared to begin in the morning, one that would provide a higher wage to support myself as a widow, and the last two of my children still living at home. My 11-year old daughter had finished her homework and gone to bed, and my 16-year old son was spending the night at a friend’s house. It had been a quiet uneventful day, and I was asleep soon after going to bed.
I was dreaming that a bell was ringing…. WAIT! A bell was ringing! It was the doorbell. I jumped up quickly, grabbed my robe, and saw a police officer through the peephole in the door. He had one hand on the doorbell while the other fist pounded on the door. I unlocked and opened the door as quickly as I could. He shouted in the dark.
“There’s been a shooting! Get to the Emergency Room as fast as you can!”
I flipped on the porch light as he turned to leave. My heart was pounding as I blurted out, “Where?” What happened?”
He responded, “Your son! That’s all I know. You need to hurry!”
“Which son?”
“I don’t know. Just hurry to St. Francis Hospital!”
He left and I shut the door. I walked slowly towards my closet wondering what to wear to the hospital. My mind seemed frozen as I slowly and methodically slid the clothes on their hangers deciding what to wear.
Suddenly it hit me. HURRY! HURRY! I put on whatever my hand touched next, and phoned someone to come to stay with my daughter. I left the door unlocked for the babysitter, and drove at maximum speed to the hospital. I parked the car in the first available space I saw and ran to the ER, where the double doors opened automatically as I approached. Running in frantically, I was met by a nurse who recognized me and thrust bloodstained clothes and hiking boots into my arms. I recognized them as belonging to my 16-year old. She warned, “You have to get to the surgery waiting room as fast as you can! The surgeon is waiting for you. Your son is still alive!”
“Alive?” “Alive?” I questioned. This couldn’t be happening.
Another nurse beckoned from the waiting elevator which I ran into breathlessly, hugging the bloody garments of my son. She entered the elevator with me, while advising in an instructional manner, where I should go when I left the elevator, which halls to follow until I got to the surgery section. She added, “Good Luck! God bless you!” as I left the elevator and ran while hugging the heavy boots and bloodstained clothes as if they were my son.
I soon spotted the surgeon waiting in his surgery blues, and I called out as I hurried to him, “What happened? What happened?”
“No time for details now,” he responded. “He’s been shot in the lung (it’s collapsed), small intestine, liver, pancreas, and his gall bladder’s shattered.”
He avoided eye contact as he added, “The only thing he’s got going for him is his age.”
“NO!” I cried. “NO! He’ll make it. He’s strong. He’s been lifting weights.” My voice was as shaky as my hands. “Where is he?” “I’m sorry,” the doctor answered, “there’s no time for you to see him. I’ve got to go in there and try to save his life. I can’t promise you anything.” “He will make it!” I insisted. “He’s lost a lot of blood,” the physician warned. “I don’t think he can survive the surgery.” He turned away and shrugged his shoulders saying softly, “I’ll do my best.”
As he disappeared through the double doors, I told myself, “He’ll make it.”
I clutched my Rosary Beads tightly in my trembling hands while I phoned some of my other 7 children, and asked them to call the others. They soon began arriving in the surgery waiting room, pale and shaken about the news of their youngest brother being shot. High school friends of my son came also, and tried to piece together what had happened. There had been a woman….a handgun accidentally went off….my son had asked everyone to pray for him….the 911 call….the time dragging by as they waited for police to arrive….the paramedics….the kids all on their knees frightened and praying….the ambulance….
I thought back to happy times.
He had been an usher in church when he was only 5. His brothers were alter boys, but he wanted to collect the money. The men who were ushers had bought him a pin to match the pins they wore, and he was a happy little boy being an usher at our church….
A nurse came and gently pried the bloody clothing and boots from my arms as she told me she would keep everything in a bag for me. She was kind and comforting as I tried to grasp what was happening. As the hours passed slowly, we as a family grew stronger in our prayers and our determination that “He will make it!” An ER nurse came into the room and told me how brave my son had been, keeping himself awake in the ambulance, he had told her, so he wouldn’t die. He had told her he fought off darkness which kept trying to take over, because he knew he would die if he closed his eyes. He had been able to participate in saving his own life because he kept himself alert, the nurse told me.
The hours dragged by until finally the surgeon, accompanied by his surgical assistant, approached us slowly with lowered head. He put his hand on my shoulder and told me, “Well, you were right. He did make it through surgery, but the next 72 hours are crucial. I really don’t expect him to pull through. I’m surprised he was even alive upon arrival here. I’m sorry.”
All I could say, in a whisper, was “He will make it.”
He glanced at his assistant whose eyes looked sadly into mine. “We’re just trying to be honest with you. I’m sorry.”
I repeated as I clutched my Rosary Beads, “He’ll make it.”
Then my children began joining in, one at a time. “Yeah, he’s going to make it.” “He’ll pull through this.” “Hey, my brother’s tough. He’ll make it.”
The two physicians walked away quietly. We waited for a few more hours until a nurse came towards us. Smiling kindly, she spoke softly.
“He’s in his room in Intensive Care. You will be allowed to see him, only two at a time, for 5 minutes each hour. You need to brace yourselves because this is difficult to see. He has many tubes both into and coming from his body. His entire chest was opened to perform the surgery.”
She offered me her hand as she said, “You can see him now. Do you need someone with you?” “No,” I replied. “I want to see him alone at first.”
I PRAYED FOR COURAGE AS SHE WALKED ME TO HIS ROOM.
As I leaned over my boy, he tried to smile but tears flowed from his frightened eyes.
“I’m sorry, Mom,” he whispered. I tried to comfort him and told him to cooperate with everyone caring for him. I knew they would soon ask him to attempt coughing and encouraged him to do his very best, because coughing was necessary to avoid complications such as pneumonia.
The next few hours were heartbreaking as I accompanied each child into the room for 5-minute visits. His brothers and sisters exclaimed, “Hey! You’re doing good.” “Keep up the good work!” “You’re tough! You’ll be fine.” Being together was our comfort and strength, and I believe it was his too. It had been six years since my husband’s death, when our family had been devastated. I could not imagine another such tragedy.
Late in the day the pulmonary technicians arrived for the coughing exercise. I reminded my son to do his best just to cough a little. They helped him to raise his head as they directed him to try to breath in….and….”COUGH!” He coughed so hard that a huge dark blood clot shot out of his mouth and across the room. It was like death itself had been ejected from his body. Nurses from the nearby station had been watching, as well as the two surgeons. They all burst into applause and cheers as he lay slowly back on his pillow, gasping. I was so proud of him! I knew my confidence in his strength had not been in vain. I knew our prayers and the intercession of our Blessed Mother were being answered. I knew of the courage in him.
His favorite childhood book had been “The Little Engine That Could.”
We all stayed through the night with visitors coming to the hospital to comfort us and assure us of their prayers. Each hour I went in with one of my children and renewed my faith. He was fighting for his life, refusing to die; his only goal was to live.
In the early morning a nurse approached us and said, “Well, folks, we are so impressed with your positive spirit and the help it is, that we are lifting the visiting rules for you. From now on, you are all welcome as often as you want in his room. You are the best thing for him!” I stayed in his room for most of the next week. There were times when I had to go outside the room to cry my tears and seek reassurance. Otherwise, I sat quietly in his room, on a rocking chair, praying the Rosary over and over. It was hard for me to see him in moments of discouragement and excruciating pain. I hated to look at him with all those tubes in and out of him. His chest was stapled together, and I could almost feel them. His moaning, his pleading, his fears, his tears and groans tore at my heart. I continued the Rosaries and my attempts to encourage him.
I remembered how he had loved to dress up as Santa Claus at age 3, and to distribute Christmas gifts to each of us.
The sounds of the machines echoed in my ears. Bubbling sounds. Sucking sounds. Beepings. Drippings. Gushings. Excretions. Pumping. Draining. The constant restless moving of his feet under the sheets. The sounds were magnified when I tried to block them out. It was his stamina that lifted my spirit and revived my faith.
Jimmy recovering from gun shot wound.
He vomited. He screamed as tubes were removed from his chest. He had some serious relapses. He cried out as the many staples were finally pulled out. All of this scared me! I often felt like running out of the hospital, but focused on prayer and stayed with him. His spirit and his craving for life lifted me.
How much I had enjoyed watching him play football in junior high!
On the day he was finally wheeled out of Intensive Care and into a private room, I was full of hope. We celebrated Christmas Day there in his room, his siblings and their spouses, nieces and nephews. He was tired but happy when we left him surrounded with gifts.
A few days later I was pleasantly surprised as I approached his room, to see him coming around the corner helped by a nurse. He was bent over, hanging on to his IV pole, shuffling slowly towards me…. smiling through grimaces. He had lost over 30 pounds and was wearing his baseball cap backwards as he always had. It was the most beautiful sight in the world for me!
What fun he had enjoyed, at the age of 10, when his father taught him to drive the old jeep truck on our mountain property. I recalled them laughing together….
It was a long time before my son left the hospital, and longer until he recovered enough to get into his yellow Volkswagen Bug, baseball cap on backwards, grinning and waving as he drove off in search of his friends and classmates.
Standing in the doorway, waving to him, I cried tears of relief and thanked God.
He had fought a good fight! He made it!