The last few days have been spent at the hospital- rooting for the very life of a wonderful man from our church family. Jim Purcell fell in his driveway this past week. From the outset, we knew he had fallen on his face, and his front teeth had gone through his upper lip. However, we didn't know how traumatic things were going to become. His wife and I were waiting for him to be brought back from a CAT scan whenever the Dr. let us know that he would be going straight to the trauma unit, because they had found blood on the brain. (He was on 3 different types of blood thinners and this was dramatically increasing the danger. During this time, he completely lost mobility in his right leg, and eventually his right arm.) After a couple more CAT scans, they found the blood was increasing, so he was taken for emergency surgery on Sunday morning. He pulled through the first surgery, and we felt good about that. The Dr. had warned us that this could continue to be a pattern. A few hours later, after yet another CAT scan, they found he was bleeding in another area of his brain, so it was back in for a 2nd emergency surgery. His precious wife asked the Dr. if he was going to make it and the Dr.'s reply was, "If I can get the bleeding stopped." How emotionally spent the family must have felt! It's really hard when you just don't know for sure how things are going to end up. The Dr. also said that if he ever saw a man with a will to live, it was Jim! And that made his medical staff want to fight all the harder to save his life.
Different ones have been asking about Jim... I am happy to report that he is starting to show some signs of recovery. He has been taken off the ventilator and talked to Dan today in somewhat of a coherent manner. The CAT scans they have done since the 2nd surgery show improvement. The Dr. did say that it would be 3 days before he can say for sure that he is "out of the woods". We're just trusting and believing!
The Dr. did say he would not regain the use of his leg, and possibly his arm. We'll see! Someone made the comment that "Jim wouldn't be driving anymore." Dan said, "If I know Jim Purcell, he'll be driving with his left leg."
Jim is a man of quiet strength. He loves children and always seems to interact in such a way that kids are drawn to him. He was the first one to take my son fishing. Dan was along for the trip as well, but Jim had invited and it was in his boat that Clayton caught his first fish.
His wife says, "I don't know of anything he can't do!" If something is broken, he will most usually always find a way to fix it. He has even sewn curtains for her. I don't know of too many men who would go out on that venture. Ha!
What was amazing to me was... even with a very black chin, a swollen, lacerated upper lip, a broken nose, and those not even being the serious things involved, he was still trying to get out the words "Thank you", whenever the nurse did something for him. And he was trying to say "I love you" to his wife. Those were some very precious moments in the midst of an extremely difficult circumstance.
We're still rooting for Jim!!
