WISE COUNTY - A North Texas man experienced something on Thursday his family thought might never happen again. He came home for Thanksgiving.
More than three years ago, Michael Sherrick suffered a traumatic brain injury at work. The care he needs has made it impossible to come home, even for a visit.
Michael was an industrial construction worker, working high above the ground. His wife, Rana, always feared he would be hurt.
On May 5, 2008, it happened. He fell.
That day, Rana lost the husband she had known for 16 years.
“We were the couple that said, ‘I love you’ before we went to bed every night,” Rana said.
Michael Sherrick suffered a traumatic brain injury, and was paralyzed.
“It's been difficult,” his wife admitted. “We were thrown into a life we didn't choose.”
It would be nearly two years before Rana would find a way to communicate with her husband - a computer that reads the motion of his eyes.
“Three blinks means 'I love you,'” Rana said. “We were able to establish that.”
Michael's fragile medical condition required living in a nursing home. He had not been back home again, until this Thanksgiving.
Fort Worth-based MedStar paramedics brought him to Crowley to join Rana, his grandchildren and a houseful of other relatives for Thanksgiving dinner. It’s part of MedStar’s Home for the Holidays program.
“It's something I guess I never thought would happen,” said Michael’s brother-in-law, Don Grazier.
It will not be Michael’s last trip home. Rana recently came into enough money to begin building a handicap-accessible home, in rural Wise County. A close friend, a registered nurse, will live with them. His mother will live next door.
“When I told him for the first time we were going to be able to bring him home, and have 24-hour care around the clock, and that he would be able to sit in his wheelchair and watch me cook in our new home [...] reclaim some of our life that's been taken from us, we cried together,” Rana said.
The new home should be ready by March. For that, and the years ahead they will share, Rana says she is thankful.
“The message is, God, family, and love,” Rana said, “And to be there for each other, no matter what.”
E-mail chawes@wfaa.com
