Would you help a man who would lay his life down to save yours?
There is a such a man and he needs help now. My husband of 30 years has been injured many times without a mention other than "Gee, that kinda hurt." He has broken his hand in 3 places in defense of another, cut off two of his fingertips doing work for others and fixed them himself when he should have gone to a hospital. He's been in four car accidents and two motorcycles accidents...fell off a moving truck at age 11. With all of the injuries he has suffered in his life he still keeps on going, selflessly. He carries custom jumper cables for his car so he can safely help anyone whose car needs a jump start. He has carried extra water and tools so he could help people he saw stranded on the side of the road. He always has stood up for others who cannot stand up for themselves. In thirty-three years of knowing him, I have never seen him refuse to help ANYONE, everyone who knows him knows that this is true and will vouch for it.
PLEASE LISTEN TO THE STORY OF A MAN WHO HAS ALWAYS HELPED OTHERS AND HAS GONE THROUGH SO MUCH PAIN AND SUFFERING IN LESS THAN A MONTH!
This last December 10, 2009 (his beloved mother's last birthday), Gerald was helping a woman bring some packages into her office building and broke his fifth metacarpal bone on his right foot in half when he slipped on the ice on the sidewalk. As usual, he yelled "Ouch, that hurt, I think I broke my foot". Sure enough, he did. The woman said to go to the hospital, but Jerry said no because he can no longer afford health insurance, and is uninsured. He knew he could not afford an ambulance let alone any doctors that would be looking at him. Luckily, the woman's own foot doctor agreed to look at Jerry free of charge. Still, before going home to rest, he stopped to wish his mother a happy birthday. After casting the foot, Jerry went right back to work. Two days later, on December 12, 2009, Jerry was working hard, pushing himself to get a job done for a woman so her company could move from their old building to their new building on time. At 4:30pm, he slipped on the cast and went into a cold sweat, forced to leave and go home. That next morning at 7:00am, Jerry woke up with both of his hands and arms in extreme pain. He went outside, looked up to the sky, and said, "God, what can I do? I cannot afford to go to the doctor or the hospital. I need help". Jerry was going to take a pain pill and go back to bed, but the next thing he remembers is hearing someone yelling, urging him to "CALL 911!!"...but no one was there except Jerry. He came inside, sat down and thankfully woke me up to call 911. Within 15 minutes, the ambulance had him at the hospital, and and he was in an operating room at Christ Hospital. Jerry was having a major heart attack.
An hour later, the doctor had come out and told us that Jerry had 100% blockage and they put a stent in his artery. Because his heart attack was so bad, they could not tell the amount of damage that was done or the extent of his other blockages. They kept him in the Intensive Care Unit for a week. Jerry was then set up for an operation on January 7, 2010.
While our family was already experiencing so much, Jerry's mother, a saint of a woman, was not doing very well. She had raised eight boys and three girls, half of this time she was a single mother. On January 5, 2010, she quietly passed away. The stress and emotional turmoil that Jerry was enduring was unbearable. He tried to put off the surgery so services for his mother could be completed, but his doctor said this would be serious mistake. Jerry's brothers and sisters agreed to postpone the wake and funeral until Jerry was out of the hospital and could attend.
On January 7, 2010, Jerry was back in surgery. The doctors hoped they could just put another stent in, but unfortunately they had to do an open heart surgery instead, and Jerry had a quadruple bypass. Surgery went well and he came out with minor damage to his heart and a nice new scar to add to what he calls "his collection." Jerry spent a week in intensive care and wowed the staff with the many people who came to see him and the numerous calls from friends and family. It's like our daughter used to always ask him when she was younger, "Daddy, do you know everybody?"
His mother's wake was held on January 15, 2010. Jerry was only out of Intensive Care for one day. He stayed at the wake from 2:00pm to 8:00pm despite his own healing needs. His family urged him to go home and rest and Jerry simply said, "No, this is my mother, nothing in the world, not even wild horses, could take me away."
The next day at the funeral, he was very visibly weak and the stress was mounting. Yet he still got up to say a few words about his mother and asked his brothers and sisters to come up with him to pay tribute to their mother.
After the funeral, Jerry did not go to the luncheon because he was too weak. He said when his breast bone healed, he would have himself a good cry for his mom since it was, of course, too painful for Jerry to cough or even cry until he regained some of his lung power and his chest healed up.
It's now been over two months and Jerry is still in a great deal of pain. He doesn't sleep well and often becomes depressed. This is a man who is normally a silly, happy go lucky, good-natured man who would help anyone any time or day without a second thought. It is a very sad story because Jerry now feels like he is a burden on us, his family.
This is where Jerry needs help. Our hospital bills are in excess of $200,000.000. We have been using our charge cards to survive, which now are reaching $20,000.00. Jerry started a small cabinet shopped when he was young and has put his life into. The building owner of the shop has been a long-time friend and told us not to worry about rent due to the circumstances and that we would figure it out later. The shop is in debt for about $21,000.00. We have also mortgaged our home to the limit which is now $198,000.00. We understand that many people are in financial turmoil right now. We hope that anyone who can help with anything could be as generous as Jerry has been his whole life. I do not feel that we are due anything in this life by other people nor do I like the idea of asking for help outside of our own family, but I'm sure most of you know someone like Jerry who would not think twice about sacrificing anything in his life to help out anyone he's ever met. I invite anyone in the Oak Lawn, Chicago Ridge, Orland Park, or Chicagoland area to log on and speak up about this man. Jerry's having a bit of a hard time excepting his new limitations. This is why we must ask for help for him. Hopefully God will send us a few angels who can help take the stress off Jerry. Please anyone who can make even the smallest sacrifice to help would never be forgotten.
Please forward to anyone you might think of that would be kind and generous, to help us get back on our feet, that's all we are asking for is a helping hand back so we can keep our business and home. Thank you and God Bless.