The Wolf Posted September 23, 2008 Share Posted September 23, 2008 OK Huddlers...it's time to come together the way this community can. I have set up a PayPal account and will collect any donations made for this great cause. Billy is choosing to take on an enormous and admirable task...and for that, he deserves our help. He's already got our respect. Please PayPal any contributions you wish to my Bubba Helps charitable account. Email address is: rob1121 AT yahoo.com Thank you all in advance...we really can make a difference. Please see my thread pinned in the Tailgate, regarding donations made to this worthy cause. Huddlers Helping Huddlers! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ziachild007 Posted September 24, 2008 Author Share Posted September 24, 2008 Thanks to the help of some of my huddle brothers, I have managed to get the ball rolling on this deal. I have decided since you have all been kind enough to share your support, prayers and well wishes with me and my family, I have decided to share some of my sister's life with you. I told my mom about the huddle and all of the great support here. She is a strong woman, but still could not hold back the tears as I told her about it and let her read this thread. So it's with her blessing and thanks that I am able to share just a little bit about my great sister, Monica. Monica and I back in the day My four sisters and I on my wedding day (Monica is on the far left) My mom and sister before the accident My sister and her dog, Pepper My Grandma, sister, and mom........three generations of wonderful women After the accident Christmas a few years ago Despite it all, she is still able to smile Haircut for Locks of Love Mom showing Monica the donation Family Again thanks to you all for the kind words, prayers, and support. --Billy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bier Meister Posted September 24, 2008 Share Posted September 24, 2008 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Apathy Posted September 24, 2008 Share Posted September 24, 2008 Billy, thanks for sharing the pictures and I'm proud to know you, my friend. If I might add very briefly, because as Wolf and others have said - the man doesn't seek the limelight or charity, but Billy is a proud father of four kids. He works extremely hard on the job, then comes home to support his wife and kids in each and every endeavor, from housework to remodeling projects to kids activities. And of course he makes time to take care of Monica and his mother and the rest of the family. And to take the edge off, he cheers for the Texans (nobody is perfect ) and manages several great leagues here at The Huddle. There are only 24 hours in a day but from what I can tell - Billy manages to squeeze everything he can out of them in a selfless manner not often seen in people. So when he says he is resolved to do something, I take him seriously and can't think of a more deserving person and family to help. So whether it's donations, prayers, suggestions, or simple words of encouragement, I know Billy takes it all in with the utmost appreciation. Thank you Wolf and Rovers and everyone else and good luck to you buddy! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Wolf Posted September 24, 2008 Share Posted September 24, 2008 Wow, Billy...thanks for sharing the pictures. You have a beautiful family and now this effort has suddenly become very real...once one has a face to go with their action, it takes on a new life. We'll get this thing done. The most important things in this world are faith, honor, and family. You've got all three going for you, which is why I am proud to help you. A Miracle For Monica Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
T-Scorp Posted September 24, 2008 Share Posted September 24, 2008 Zia, Don't know if you have checked this out yet. CMT does a mobile home maker over show. Looks like they may just stay in CA but who knows...worth a shot. CMT Mobile Home Disaster Good luck and God bless PS I too grew up with 4 sisters. Never got to use the phone or the bathroom growing up! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Wolf Posted September 24, 2008 Share Posted September 24, 2008 Zia, Don't know if you have checked this out yet. CMT does a mobile home maker over show. Looks like they may just stay in CA but who knows...worth a shot. CMT Mobile Home Disaster Good luck and God bless PS I too grew up with 4 sisters. Never got to use the phone or the bathroom growing up! Good call, Michael...thanks! PS...hope you got the bathroom thingy squared away...! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ziachild007 Posted September 24, 2008 Author Share Posted September 24, 2008 I am wanting to do some sort of website about her too. Who is the resident huddle eggspurt when it comes to creating websites and such? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Wolf Posted September 24, 2008 Share Posted September 24, 2008 I am wanting to do some sort of website about her too. Who is the resident huddle eggspurt when it comes to creating websites and such? TOS is really good from what I understand. Not sure what his work load is at the moment though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fatman Posted September 24, 2008 Share Posted September 24, 2008 Good photos. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
keggerz Posted September 24, 2008 Share Posted September 24, 2008 TOS is really good from what I understand. Not sure what his work load is at the moment though. I know that TOS does MFL stuff not sure about websites or not but I do know that Cliaz is versed in website creation Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tazinib1 Posted September 28, 2008 Share Posted September 28, 2008 Talked to Zia tonight and I'm will be making an effort Monday when I return to the show to see if I know anybody that knows anybody that works on the Extreme Makeover. At the very least I can maybe put an eye out for his video. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
darin3 Posted September 28, 2008 Share Posted September 28, 2008 Talked to Zia tonight and I'm will be making an effort Monday when I return to the show to see if I know anybody that knows anybody that works on the Extreme Makeover. At the very least I can maybe put an eye out for his video. I went to college with Paige Hemmis from the show, and have emailed the show to see if there'd be any way to use that connection. No word back yet. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Clubfoothead Posted September 28, 2008 Share Posted September 28, 2008 Awesome stuff man. I hope you are doing well. You still need to call me or email me when you get some time. I will leave all the stuff on my desk until you tell me you don't need it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
whoopazz Posted September 28, 2008 Share Posted September 28, 2008 Very touching and thanks for sharing Zia. My thoughts and prayers are with you and yours. Best wishes with the project. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ziachild007 Posted September 28, 2008 Author Share Posted September 28, 2008 Awesome stuff man. I hope you are doing well. You still need to call me or email me when you get some time. I will leave all the stuff on my desk until you tell me you don't need it. Sorry Clubby. Been talking to the huddle lawyers to see the best way to set it up. Looks like a special needs trust might be the way to go, but still checking. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tbimm Posted September 28, 2008 Share Posted September 28, 2008 (edited) I have been reading about this in a few of the forums here. It kills me not to have anything to offer. With my life being what it has been the last month I am tapped out! I am so proud of all of my Huddle brethren for what you are all doing here! Billly you are a good man and brother. As soon as I get my situation straight I will help in any way that I can! Edited September 28, 2008 by tbimm Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ziachild007 Posted October 2, 2008 Author Share Posted October 2, 2008 For those that are keeping up with this, sorry for the lack of updates, been a busy week. Cliaz has been kind enough ti give me a hand with creating a website for my sister to give folks a better idea of what she has gone through. I am still working on getting some of the pictures scanned, but here is the more detailed events of her accident, as written by my mom. My daughter Monica Sipes now 34 years old was hit by a car 7 years ago. She was on her way to the ballpark riding her 10 speed. She was about three blocks from the ballpark and pulled over to the curb and stopped to take a drink of water. While sitting next to the curb a vehicle driven by a 16 year old newly licensed girl hit Monica from behind sending Monica into the windshield and landing 50 feet from the point of impact. Monica apparently heard the car and looked back unable to move and straddled the bike because the bike was laying next to her. Monica suffered a closed head injury and was nonresponsive. She was taken to the hospital that she worked at as an LVN, they responded immediately at saving her life and took x-rays and a CT scan. They did all they could for her there, she was intubated and transfered to a trama hospital in Amarillo, Tx. All the physicians and nurses were her co-workers and friends. This was an extremely hard situation for them to have to deal with, not only was she a victim of a terrible accident but she was their friend and their co-worker. The helicopter wasn't available at the time so she was transfered by ambulance halfway to Amarillo and then airlifted as soon as the helicopter was available. Upon arrival at the ER in Amarillo a general evaluation was performed as well as a head CT and a cervical spine CT, chest and pelvis x-rays. No rib fractures were found or clavicle fractures. No fracturers of the scapula. No pelvic fractures were found. No neck injuries. She was already in a deep coma. The head CT showed a comminuted fracture in the right frontotemporal area. There was a large epidural hematoma with mass effect from right to left. No fractures were revealed on the cervical spine CT. The Dr. diagnoised Monica with right frontotemporal contusions, epidural hematoma and poly-traumatized patient. She was immediately taken to the operating room for emergency craniotomy. Monica was in a very critical condition We were contacted immediately, unable to get any flights out the family drove for twelve hours to get to her. We live in Diana, Tx and she was in Amarillo, Tx. By the time we arrived she had already had surgury, she underwent craniectomy and evacuation of the intracranial hematoma. The bone flap was removed and left out due to swelling of the brain. She was placed on a ventilator, there was a subdural ICP monitor and subgaleal drain to relieve pressure on her very swollen brain. There were IV tubes, cathater tubes and monitors to check her vitals. It was not a sight that a mother, father, or sibling wants to see. It was heart and gut wrenching to see her so badly hurt. Her face was badly bruised and swollen, her cheek bones, and nose were shattered, she was totally unrecognizeable. We were told that the next 72 hours would determine the outcome, we were actually given little hope of survival as she had suffered a bad closed head injury. She had slipped into a deep coma. All we could do was pray and ask God to intervine and that his will be done. She survived the 72 hours and would encounter many more complications. She was being feed intraveniously but was then put on a PEG feeding tube. She also underwent a tracheostomy. She had numerous infections which were causing very high fevers, they were caused by her central line, which she had several times. Every time a central line was inserted her right lung would be punctured causing another complication and insertion al a drain tube from her lung. She had pneumonia , meningutius due to gram-negative mellitus and diabetes insipidus, not tolerating her feeding leading to gastric complications which involved removal of her gallbaldder. She had severe swelling on the right side of her head due to non draining of fluid, she had to have a spinal lumbar drain tube. We were in Amarillo from June 11, 2001 until August 14. I was told by by neuro-surgeon that I should consider letting her go. I asked them how I was supposed to do that, we had already asked if the ventilator was keeping her alive and the machine had been turned off but Monica could breath on her own, the machine was only making it easier for her to breath. I was told to agree to withhold feeding and hydration. I would not agree to starving her or dehydrating her. That was not something I could not do. For some unknown reason I remembered a situation that Monica had encountered when she was about 16 years old. My youngest daughter Stephanie had a cat that had a littler of kittens. The mama cat got ran over and a day old kitten was left behind . Monica heard the kitten under the porch and decided that she needed to save that kitten. The kitten had been there for a day before she found it. I remember telling her that there was no way that the kitten would or could make it, and I told her to just let it go. But Monica was determined to give it her best to save that kitten. She was up at all hours feeding the kitten with an eye dropper, keeping it warm and doing all she could. That little kitten pulled through and grew up to a full sized cat. The only thing was it couldn't meow. That gave me the strength and the courage to make up my mind that I had to do what I could to give her a chance. Monica had survived two months and I couldn't just give up on her now. I was asked to start finding a nursing home for her. I chose to have her transfered to a hospital closer to my home, which was to Trinity Mother Francis Hospital in Tyler, TX. There we spend three weeks with the same request to put her in comfort care and let her go. We were told that Monica at some point while she was in Amarillo had suffered a stroke on the right side. They tried to go in and open up the clog but the artery was spasming and the procedure couldn't be done. Monica was transfered from the ICU floor to comfort care. She had been there about a week and was getting pneumonia and was not being suctioned, she was being left to choke on her own secretions. I had watched the nurses suction her trac tube, so I took it upon myself to suction her. Meanwhile I looked into a long-term acute hospital in Louisiana, Life Care long-term care. I was able to get her transferred. Here she was treated with dignity and cared for like she needed to be. First they took care of the immediate complicatons. Got her over the pneumonia and they started trying to ween her of of the trac by plugging off the tube and letting her breath through her mouth. Then one night I was called about 3 in the morning to let me know that the trac tube had fell out during the night and the trac site was already closing. But she picked up breathing normally, so that was one less thing to have to deal with. She started showing signs of awareness. She was put on a medication that is used to help with awareness, Provigil. She was taken to rehabilitation on a daily basis after she started showing signs of awareness and was diagnosed as semi-comatose. She eventually started tracking and was making good progress. They would place her on a standing table and she tolorated that well. All was being done to keep her arms and legs range of motion although she had a lot of tone in her left arm. We had been there for about two and a half months and all was looking favorable. I had even returned back to work and was okay with her being in Shreveport. LA which was only about a 45 minute drive to see her. On my regular visit to see her on Friday I was asked to go to the administration office. There I was told that I needed to find a nursing home for Monica because the insurance would no longer pay for her stay and rehabilitation. I couldn't understand why, she had a good insurance with a 2 million maximum payout on claims. She hadn't even used 1 million and she was being denied. Turns out the hospital that she worked for decided to change insurance carriers and since Monica was no longer employed by them they couldn't continue insurance on her. I called the insurance company and told them that I thought that since she was insured with them at the time of the injury that they had to follow her care and pay the claims. But that was not the case, small fine print got them off the hook stating that they could cancel out. I contacted attorneys, the governor, senator, you name it and I kept getting the same story, no one would take the case. We ended up getting on Cobra insurance which was really no good for Monica as she was out of network and they wouldn't pay for any of her care here in East Texas. I was asked to try to find to a nursing home. But she was still not on Medicare or Medicade. I couldn't pay private pay for her nursing care, we were looking at $3,000 a month. She couldn't get on Medicade because she had a saving account that contained more money than you are allowed to have to qualify, but not enough to pay for maybe two months stay, and we couldn't touch it because it was still locked awaiting legalities. We applied for Medicare but I found out that she would have to wait two years after being diagnosed with a disability before she could start receiving health insurance. We were really in a pickle. She was to be discharged in two days. So the only choice I had was to quite my job as Marketing Director and Advertising Coordinator of the company I worked for. I didn't even have time to give a two week notice. I was taken through a one hour observation of how to care for Monica I was shown how to give her medications and care of ther Peg tube and giving her her feeding. Shown to bathe and dress her. I was shown how to transfer her from bed to chair and chair to bed. How to work with her to keep range of motion of arms and legs. She was sent home still semi-comatose, minuminly conscious. I was terrified, wasn't sure how I was going to do this. But by the grace of God I have been able to care for her for about six years now. She is now a victim of traumatic brain injury also having suffered a mild stroke during the first two weeks after the injury. She has little mobility of her arms and legs, cannot eat, is tube fed, cannot walk, is aware of her surroundings, she does laugh appropriately but cannot speak and cannot communicate except for eye blinks, seems to blink twice for yes and once for no. She was injured 7 years ago at the age of 26. Monica was a nurse at a Panhandle hospital in Dalhart, Texas. I now take care of her at home and work with her daily trying to keep what little motor skills she has and am always searching for some kind of breakthrough to help her advance to the next level. We have had many complications since she was sent home. We have dealt with uniary tract infections, eye infections, stones in her bile duct requiring an ERCP procedure, chest congestions but only one case of mild pnenumonia. I have tried getting her into rehabilitation, but no one will accept her because she can't respond to commands. We did have speech, physical and occupational therapists come to our home to work with her, but the problem with home therapy is their care is very short termed. I think the longest we had was the speech pathologist who worked with her for about 3 months. We are now on our own. I do what I can to care for her on a daily basis. Her inability to communicate makes it hard to know what to do for her when she encounters distress. Our home was not handicap accessible when I brought her home. We live in a single wide 14X80 mobile home that I have had for 28 years. Monica's room is a small 14X11 room and it contains her hospital bed, wheelchair, hoyer lift, dresser and medicine cabinet. It is a little testy to move around when I am transfering her from bed to chair and visa versa. Her outings are very minimal, from her room to the living area and to the kitchen. Her chair really takes up a lot of room but we make due. Her outside outings are very little, we have a ramp out to the front of the house and out the back but that is as far as we can take her because we have no sidewalks. The land is very rough and rockey and the wheelchair doesn't roll very smooth. I do have a screened in gazebo out back but the weather here in East Texas doesn't allow for very many times to get outside. She seems to be content now that she is home. She now seems aware of her surroundings, watches TV, enjoys having our little angels, her neices and nephew visit her. These children have always from the time they were babies old enough to express love and affection by giving hugs and kisses have loved her unconditionally. She gives them her entire attention and laughs appropriately at the cute little things that they do and say. Monica still has her humor because you can speak to her and she responds to things with humor appropriately with a smile, a little laughter or if it is really funny a breath taking laughter. I will take care of Monica as long as God gives me the strength and ability to do so. I do worry about alot of things. I wonder how long this old house will hold up before it starts falling apart, it is already starting to show some wear. My husband isn't able to do much as far as home repairs because he has had four heart surguries and also has degenerative disk disease. He recently underwent back surgery, a level 2 fusion. I do whatever needs to be done. I don't like it when we get those East Texas storms because I have no place to take shelter with Monica, we have a storm shelter, but getting Monica down in it is very hard. My son and I did have to carry her down in the shelter last summer, but it wasn't an easy task, getting her out was even more diffucult. I try not to let worries consume my day, it only interfers with my emotions and complicates things. We are blessed to have Monica each and everyday that God gives us. 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cdrudge Posted October 2, 2008 Share Posted October 2, 2008 I'm a little late to the discussion, but I do want to mention the financial downside of Extreme Makeover if you end up going that route. The homeowners are ultimately responsible for taxes not only for the initial "gift" of the home, but the ongoing property tax payments. Going from a mobile home to a typical EM home is going to have a large sticker shock. There have been more then a few instances of people who have received large gifts having to ultimately give them up/sell them because they couldn't handle the new tax payments. There are ways to help reduce the taxes, but it's not just smooth sailing either. In addition to the HFH idea, I would check with local charities for guidance. They may not be able to help directly, but they may know of additional resources to get you on the right path. I know in my area we have a Catholic Social Services as well as a Lutheran counterpart. They typically do smaller projects like wheelchair ramps or other handicap accessible features and not whole homes, but that is where I would start. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Wolf Posted October 2, 2008 Share Posted October 2, 2008 I'm a little late to the discussion, but I do want to mention the financial downside of Extreme Makeover if you end up going that route. The homeowners are ultimately responsible for taxes not only for the initial "gift" of the home, but the ongoing property tax payments. Going from a mobile home to a typical EM home is going to have a large sticker shock. There have been more then a few instances of people who have received large gifts having to ultimately give them up/sell them because they couldn't handle the new tax payments. There are ways to help reduce the taxes, but it's not just smooth sailing either. In addition to the HFH idea, I would check with local charities for guidance. They may not be able to help directly, but they may know of additional resources to get you on the right path. I know in my area we have a Catholic Social Services as well as a Lutheran counterpart. They typically do smaller projects like wheelchair ramps or other handicap accessible features and not whole homes, but that is where I would start. Good info here. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hat Trick Posted October 2, 2008 Share Posted October 2, 2008 Very touching story Zia. I am so proud of your family doing what needs to be done to keep your family together! I'll continue to keep your family in my prayers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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