This week is a hard week. I start feeling sentimental and emotional. This week would be Kevin's (my husbands brother) 26th Birthday.
Kevin and I didn't always get along. He was a pain in the butt. He was stubborn. But we had actually started getting along better before he died.
On October 7, 2011 it was a beautiful day out. Hoodie and flip flop weather, my favorite kind. The kids and I were at my mother in laws waiting for Matt to get off work and Kevin had stopped by and suggested that we had a bon fire that night. When Kevin and Grace, his new girlfriend, showed up, they had a dog with them. We all hung out and talked, ate and played with the puppy. It was getting late so we brought the kids home and Matt and the kids went to bed. For some reason I just couldn't sleep. I stayed up watching Burlesque until midnight. I remember turning it off at 12:02 and thinking that the next day was going to be a long day since I had to work from 9:30 til 8.
Ill never forget waking up to my sister calling out for us. I thought, what happened? What's wrong? Why is my sister here at 2:00am? She was calling out from the living room..."Matt, Rachael..Matt." We sat up and she said, "Matt, I need you to come here." He said, "No, Just tell me." She broke down and said, "Your brothers been shot." I honestly thought it was a nightmare. I didn't think it was real. We were just with him. The moan/scream that Matt let out and knowing that Ashley had to be the one to tell him will probably haunt me forever. He got dressed really fast and Ashley and Scotty followed him to Bethesda to make sure he got there ok. They came back and got the kids and I sped over there. I got there minutes before Denise. We waited for her and once she got there we all piled in the van and started driving to Pittsburgh. It was silent for a few minutes but she told us that the life flight crew had told her to call Wheeling because if he expired before they got there they were going to land there. Expired?! Milk expires. Coupons expire. People die. Kevin couldn't die.
When we got to UPMC, they led us all in this hall way and told us Kevin was in surgery. He had been shot in the brain. The doctor said that when the bullet hit it had shattered and they had to remove 70% of the left side of his brain and he was in a coma. I kind of lost it. I know this is going to sound crazy and totally selfish. But my first thought was Oh my God, were going to have to go through this all over again. Were going to have to relive the nightmare of my brother being in a coma for 2 months. Of the wondering will he make it. The surgeries and illnesses and therapy. I think the doctor was surprised that I had the worst reaction until Denise explained that my brother had been in a coma and had severe brain stem damage. I said, "But John made it. Kevin can too." The look the doctor game me said a lot. He told me that my brother still had his brain and they had taken so much of Kevin's out that there was still a good possibility he wouldn't make it and even if he did it wouldn't be good. We waited for him to get out of surgery for hours. I remember calling work and my mom and just begging her to pray. When we were finally able to go back and see him it was devastating. The next few days were a blur. We stayed up at the hospital until Sunday night. We drove the hour drive home, the whole time worrying. He had made it through the weekend. But for how much longer. How were we going to drive the hour every week to see him. How were we going to tell the kids. How were his babies going to handle it? His poor babies. Cameron was old enough to realize and poor Logan. Would Kevin make it to see his baby turn one? We picked the kids up that night and hugged them so tight. The next day we both went to work. I got the phone call around noon. Matt called and said that we needed to get up there. Quickly. Matts aunt Donna picked us up and we drove up. Kevin made it through the night but they told us to say our goodbyes. After Matt said goodbye, he wouldn't go back in the room with him. I thought it was crazy at the time. Eventually they told us that his pituitary gland was shutting down and that it was shutting his body down, one organ at a time. He was going to die and there was nothing we could do to change it.
Tuesday afternoon, Denise, Donna, Junior (Matts dad), Johnna (The boys' mom) and I went back to say our final goodbyes while they took Kevin off life support. I wasn't going to go back but Johnna grabbed my hand and said Please, I have no one with me. Kevin was an organ donor so they told us that if he died within the hour they would be able to harvest his organs. His recipients were already at the hospital waiting. We went in and Kevin was covered in blue drapes. All we could see was his hand. It was hard. By far the hardest thing Ive ever experienced. Denise kept telling him to be strong. To go to Heaven to be with Lexi, his daughter that Johnna had miscarried at 27 weeks. I grabbed his hands and I told him that we loved him. That Matt and I promised that we would help take care of Cameron and Logan. That he could go be with Lexi and quit suffering. We all broke down and Aunt Donna started singing Amazing Grace. Eventually they told us that he had survived the hour and that his organs were no longer viable. We went into this small room where Matt and David (Matts step dad) were waiting. We were all talking fast about how Kevin was such a fighter and he was going to pull through this. He had done the unexpected and survived the hour. He could pull through. When the organ donor specialist came in, she reminded us that Kevin was still dying. His body was shutting down and he wasn't going to live. That night, Denise and David stayed in the room all night with him. She said that she was literally up all night long talking because every time she would quit talking his machines would start beeping.
Wednesday morning Denise came into the waiting room and woke me up and asked me to go sit with him so that she could get a little bit of sleep. I went in and prayed with Kevin. I begged him that if he could hear me, Please pray to God to forgive him of his sins. I talked to him about the kids. I told him we loved him and I just sat there holding his hand. Eventually Johnna came in and I went and got the nurse. He was soooooo hot. He felt like he was on fire and you could literally see his heart working so hard and palpating through his chest. I knew it wouldn't be long but asked if there was anything they could do about his fever. She said she could give him some Tylenol but we would have to leave since it was a suppository. Johnna and I went and grabbed breakfast and went back to the room. When we got there, Junior was there and asked if Johnna wanted to go smoke. I stayed with Kevin. I just sat there quietly holding his hand. I watched the monitor, which only had his blood oxygen level, heart beat, and respiration. His heart rate was up in the 100s because it was beating so fast. I watched his oxygen level go from in the 30's down to about 12 and I called Denise and told her to hurry and get back here. I called Johnna and told them to hurry. When Denise walked in the room, she said Im here. That's all it took, was hearing her voice, and it spiked back up to 30. It was amazing. The nurse came in and was telling everyone that this happened a lot. That they didn't want to go in front of their family so they would wait. They were all talking amongst themselves but I was just paying attention to the monitor. To how fast his oxygen was dropping. I motioned for Denise and we all just watched. Ill never forget the sound of his breaths. His last one, he inhaled so deeply and I had to get out of there. I just kept thinking that I didnt want to be there for when his heart stopped. I didnt want to hear the machine. So I left the room and went to find Matt. He still couldn't back. When I walked in the waiting room I just hugged him. I didnt even have to tell him. He knew. He whispered, Hes gone? and I just shook my head. We had lost him. He had lost his brother. They had lost their dad. How do you tell a 4 year old that daddy isn't coming back?
Kevin was shot over a dog. Cameron and Logan lost their daddy over a dog. When Kevin and Grace had gotten home that night the dog got loose. Bill, their neighbor, knocked on the door and started arguing with Kevin. Kevin had shut the door and Bill continued to yell and told Kevin to fight like a man. Kevin opened up the window and yelled out to Bill to shut up and go home. Bill told Kevin that he had a gun. Kevin said, so what I have a bigger one and Bill pulled his gun out and shot Kevin in the head. He called the cops and said that he had to kill a man. Than he called his dad and told him to come get his guns. When Bill was on trial, they tried to say it was self defence. That Kevin had been outside fighting with Bill over the gun. They tried to make it seem like Kevin was on drugs and was a drug crazed lunatic. The thing is, throughout the whole trial, Bill never seemed remorseful. He never apologized until the day he got sentenced. He got life in prison with the possibility of parole in 18 years. I pray he never gets out.
This year, Kevin would be 26. Happy birthday Kebi. We love and miss you so much.
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