When I was in high school, John was my next door neighbor and frequent partner in crime. Over the last 45 years, his family has become my family. I could tell endless stories, but I would first have to check the individual statutes of limitations.
A few of years ago, while attending his daughter's wedding in Oklahoma, he had a severely debilitating stroke. For several reasons, he ended up stuck in Oklahoma, in a nursing home.
On Wednesday, John's brother Jerry rented a motor home, and along with his son Jaime and a caregiver, we set sail for Wynnewood, OK. We arrived on Friday morning, which happened to be John's 61st birthday and surprised him with a card that said, “Pack your stuff, you're going home.”
We rolled out of Wynnewood around noon Friday and were on the doorstep of his new care center in Phoenix shortly after sunup Saturday morning.
We went out there on I-17, I-40 and I-35, but because of weather, we returned on I-35, I-30, I-20 and I-10. Did you know there's a country song for just about every city on the entire route?
me......John......Jaime - half a lifetime ago in the Arizona desert
No Doubt a wonderful thing to do and a great friendship.
You can do many things in life, one of them is to pick your friends. He did well!!
------------------ Ron
Isn't it strange that after a bombing, everyone blames the bomber, his upbringing, his environment, his culture, his mental state but … after a shooting, the problem is the gun?
My Uncle Frank was a staunch Conservative and voted straight Republican until the day he died in Chicago. Since then he has voted Democrat. Shrug
[This message has been edited by blackrams (edited 05-01-2016).]
How is his progress since the stroke, I mean is he getting any better?
If not I have a suggestion for a place that maybe able to help his rehab. After mine I had all I could do to walk a straight line, you may have seen video I posted of me walking to the incredible mailbox of doom. kind of drifting off to the left.
Anyway the place is part of the united way and helped me a lot,
Hope he gets better and that was I good deed you did. wish I had friends that would do that.
Steve
[This message has been edited by 84fiero123 (edited 05-01-2016).]
How is his progress since the stroke, I mean is he getting any better?
If not I have a suggestion for a place that maybe able to help his rehab. After mine I had all I could do to walk a straight line, you may have seen video I posted of me walking to the incredible mailbox of doom. kind of drifting off to the left.
Anyway the place is part of the united way and helped me a lot,
Hope he gets better and that was I good deed you did. wish I had friends that would do that.
Steve
His progress has not been good. We don't think he was getting the help he needed in Oklahoma and that was another reason we wanted to bring him home. When I say severely debilitated I mean that he is wheelchair bound, has almost no use of his right side and has great difficulty with speech. That's why transporting him was a big project. We had to have a bed and a caregiver, and had to keep travel time to a bare minimum. We were lucky to find a girl who was willing to spend four days in a motor home with a pack of lecherous old men. There were some complications in finding a place that was equipped to handle his needs. Steve, if you have suggestions that might help, I would appreciate the info.
I want to tell you a story about a former friend of mine, and first off I want to re-iterate that this is not a story that is by any means meant to be negative. It is to tell you how lucky that you are to be able to have such a long-term friendship, from someone that knows an ending from the other side.
In 1983, when I was a freshman in high school, I met this kid one day, and we became friends instantly. I still remember him wearing this red "I Luv Softball" shirt, and when I asked him about playing softball, he told me "Actually, I hate it".(That was the kind of person that he was). He said that the only reason that he was wearing it, was that he had gotten it for free. To this day, I have never met a friend that I felt like I had always known, like I did him.
We soon became best friends, despite coming from different backgrounds(My Father owned several convenience stores, and he was "poor as Jacobs' Turkey"), and running around with different friends. Neither of us were old enough to drive yet, so that was a big roadblock to doing things together. His Father was a guard at the local college, and I would have my Father drop me off there on Saturday mornings, and his Father would bring me home at the end of his shift.
We had so much fun there. This college did not have Friday classes. It is very small, and the Friday class deal was meant to be a draw to attract students. His Father being the only security guard, we had the run of an entire campus. We did some stupid things that I would never do now(like drive the school vehicles). We would even sneak the keys from his Father, and drive the patrol car. It had lights, sirens and a radio that was connected to the local police frequency. It was a clay-colored 1978 Ford Granada. The show "The A-Team" was popular at the time, and the school had this van that we would drive around campus and pretend that we were them. I was Hannibal, and he was Murdock. We learned to drive and got cars during that time, and would drag-race occasionally on the main entrance of campus(until someone saw us, and called the local police). Being that it is state property, the local police radioed his father about what was going on, and suffice to say, that was the end of our drag-races. We were just young, and doing the dumb things that kids do.
In 1985, when we were Juniors in high school, he told me that he was moving 20 miles away, because his Father wanted to move back to his home town. While we could both drive, we were still teenagers in school, so we could not just drive to the other persons house in a few minutes like we could before. Still we managed to keep in touch, despite this being way before the days of cell phones, text messages, facebook, and free long-distance phone calls. We wrote letters, and called when we could, but we still remained best friends. That is how strong out friendship was. He reminded me of John Candy in "Uncle Buck", when the movie came out, and he would call himself that. It became one of our favorite movies. I About five years ago, I saw a car just like the one that Buck drove in the movie. Beat up and everything. I tried to chase the people driving it down to purchase it for him, but lost them in traffic. We also liked "Planes, Trains And Automobiles". We were just like John Candy and Steve Martin in real life. We WERE the movie. He could talk just like Billy Bob Thorton in "SlingBlade" and we had a lot of fun at drive-thru's. He would say "What you go in there's good to eat?" "You got any biscuits for sale in 'ere?" It would crack the workers up when the movie was popular.
I graduated high school in 1986, but he had somehow come up short, and had to go a half-year in the 86-87 school year to finish.(Which I didn't even know that you could do) in order to graduate. I headed off to college in September, but it was only 50 miles away, so I decided to commute.
He took a job, and would come down on weekends during that time, and our favorite thing to do was to go and rent a videotape, and eat at this local independent sub shop, that still made the best subs that I have ever eaten. They went out of business long ago.
In 1987, I carried his father's casket after he battled cancer.
In 1997, I stood at his side at his wedding to a woman that I knew was no good for him, as his best man, and a few years later, listened to him tell about his divorce for the same reasons.
Being married changed him, and he was never the person that he had been before. I hadn't talked to him much besides car shows when he was married. They had a son of their own after getting married, and of course, she had brought two of her own kids in.
When he divorced, he seemed to have problems wanting to work, and never really did after that. I even got a couple of jobs for him. One he quit after two weeks, and one he refused to take, even after I told him that I would fix his car so that he could do it. He also became VERY unreliable. To give an example, when my Mother died, we had a private memorial before the service for the family that I had invited him to and he didn't even show up. He barley made it to the cemetery to be a Pallbearer. The service was almost over, and he arrived with a car full of screaming kids because his ex-wife was "too tired" to keep them while he carried his best friends Mother's casket.
Things went downhill from that time on. His Mother had retired by now, and had a problem with us doing just about anything. She would try her best to interfere in any way possible. That and the fact that his ex-wife also did just about the same thing and he allowed both of them to do it was a big part of the problem.
The beginning of the end, was that three years ago, I was at a local mall, and my Cadillac decided that it was time to act up again and didn't want to start. I was only 15 minutes from home, and had the dumb idea to walk it. I ended up walking through a seedy part of town at dusk, and this group of young people were walking directly towards me, I called him and told him that if he did not hear from me in five minutes, to call the police. I never heard back from him. He had decided to put the phone down and go and eat the Taco Bell that his mother had brought home. He later told me that I shouldn't be upset.
His Mother died in 2012, and I stood in the rain at her graveside for the service.
That was the beginning of the end, as he got even worse after that. I helped him with money, after he blew through $26,000 in six weeks with nothing to show for it until I realized that he was not trying to better his situation. He didn't appreciate it anyway.
In April of 2014, I broke off our friendship, just shy of 31 years. He tried to contact me for over a year, before I got tired of it, and sent a text telling him that I was someone else and had the number now. The last that I heard, he was letting a drug dealer live with him, had sold his Mother's car to said drug dealer who hadn't paid him and when my friend took it back, the drug dealer stole and vandalized it. The car was later sold at auction after the police impounded it in a field. A 2008 Impala.
Be glad that you have such a good friend that you can grow old together with. I was planning to grow old with mine.
Originally posted by williegoat: His progress has not been good. We don't think he was getting the help he needed in Oklahoma and that was another reason we wanted to bring him home. When I say severely debilitated I mean that he is wheelchair bound, has almost no use of his right side and has great difficulty with speech. That's why transporting him was a big project. We had to have a bed and a caregiver, and had to keep travel time to a bare minimum. We were lucky to find a girl who was willing to spend four days in a motor home with a pack of lecherous old men. There were some complications in finding a place that was equipped to handle his needs. Steve, if you have suggestions that might help, I would appreciate the info.
Keep at it, call your local United way I can't find it, you find the closest one then look at their rehab section. you have a few zip codes in your town from what I found. Wait did you say you brought him to another town, just use that zip code. They have thing for stroke recovery. When I went my doctor said that was as good as I was going to get. Melanie found this place in Lewiston, ME that had me there 3 days a week. doing more in-house in a week than I got at the other place that gave up on me. The people really cared about all the people there and you know what, it didn't cost anything Free, but check them out, hell check all the local stroke rehab joints. Sounds like just about any of them could still help him if he works at it. The hardest part was my memory and balance. I am still not 100% but I a hell of a lot better than the stumbling couldn't say complete sentences, well may I haven't gotten completely better on my memory thing.
Dam, my memory is still shot, I forgot to add a link,
But I am a lot better than I was before I went there, I think it was 05 or maybe 06 I went there and may have mentioned it in threads back then when questioned about my bad spelling a grammar on threads. Look back at some of the threads from December 04 to a while after that. I can now most times make a coherent sentence, can't I , sometimes anyway.
Good luck dude, maybe go to some sessions with him and make him work those things at home with help if necessary but keep on his ass and make him work for it. But my stroke was what my doctor called mild but that I could never go back to the work I did before, to dangerous for someone with my balance issues and memory problems, that I still have, but to a much lesser degree now than after the original stroke. but there is always hope Do what you can for him, he sounds like a keeper to.
after the stroke I first spent a lot of time sleeping before I started rehab and saw something on the net about a study using Viagra when you are having a stroke that look promising for people to stop it from progressing after taking it. But that was just a study back then, my doctor just fluffed it of. Hey it was a study by the AMA or one of the other big agency's. Yet he just fluffed it off. Hey I didn't tell for myself, I wanted him to check out the study and see what he thought. He never even read it or mentioned it again, 12 years later, but then he does work for Frankenstein memorial.
So it also depends on his doctor to, check out the Doctor real well, see what the people who are his patients opinion of him. areas of study, all that crap, hey you are going to be or someone is going to getting him a new doc in the local area, its not like he is going to go back to the one he had back there.
Good luck, you are going to need it, but something tells me you already know that, it's good he has as good a friend as you are. Good vibes his recovery isn't over yet and he gets a lot better. and anytime you want call me or post, PM how ever you fell more comfortable.
Steve
[This message has been edited by 84fiero123 (edited 05-01-2016).]
He has burned all bridges with me. I take and take and take, but when I am done with someone, I am done with them for good. And I am done with him. He is a totally different person than the one that I knew.
I have never gone back on someone when I get to this point, and I have had people that I used to care about need help.
If we knew the same people, they would tell you that I am being straightforward.
He has burned all bridges with me. I take and take and take, but when I am done with someone, I am done with them for good. And I am done with him. He is a totally different person than the one that I knew.
I have never gone back on someone when I get to this point, and I have had people that I used to care about need help.
If we knew the same people, they would tell you that I am being straightforward.
-FF 1986 Fiero 2M6
This might sound funny but my best friend of 6 years will probably end up going down that same path your friend did. He's already shown plenty of those traits... As of now his life doesn't impact mine, so I'm fine being buddies. Its hard to watch.. I try to keep him straight, but I've given up on that. Not much I can really do. We keep growing apart, I'm almost done with my engineering degree and have a awesome job working as one. Where he just works as a laborer for a general contractor... I grew up with way less money then him. Just my parents were pretty strict, but they always pushed me to learn and create. His parents let him do whatever, play video games all day, or tell them to F@*k off. Everyone's in your life for a reason, some stay to long, others don't stay long enough... My buddy is motivation for me to not be like him, however, he's the only person that I can have fun with and chill too. I work really hard, on everything. Its nice when he comes over, and forces me to do nothing... I need that. Or I'd go crazy haha
This might sound funny but my best friend of 6 years will probably end up going down that same path your friend did. He's already shown plenty of those traits... As of now his life doesn't impact mine, so I'm fine being buddies. Its hard to watch.. I try to keep him straight, but I've given up on that. Not much I can really do. We keep growing apart, I'm almosHedone with my engineering degree and have a awesome job working as one. Where he just works as a laborer for a general contractor... I grew up with way less money then him. Just my parents were pretty strict, but they always pushed me to learn and create. His parents let him do whatever, play video games all day, or tell them to F@*k off. Everyone's in your life for a reason, some stay to long, others don't stay long enough... My buddy is motivation for me to not be like him, however, he's the only person that I can have fun with and chill too. I work really hard, on everything. Its nice when he comes over, and forces me to do nothing... I need that. Or I'd go crazy haha
I really hope that your friend is able to pull himself up out of all of this. My friend does not have the intestinal fortitude to do it. He was always kind of the poster child for bad decisions, but up until the past few years, they were mostly harmless bad decisions. After we quit talking, he started a letter-writing campaign to me, before finally giving up. One of the things that he told me was that this $6,000 shed(barn) that his mother had built with part of her retirement proceeds to replace another shed that he had burned had "burned to the ground". He could not call the fire department, because a few years ago, he set a fire at the edge of the woods behind his house, and three company's of fire fighters spent the night fighting the resulting forest fire. He burned almost an acre of woods. The fire chief told him that if he set any more fires, he would go to jail.
I could write a book of similar situations.
I would like to have him over like you do your friend, but now you never knew who he would show up with. It was always at least a bunch of misbehaving kids that would tear your house up if you didn't watch them(he would not) and for a while, he was running around with his cousins husband, who was wanted out of North Carolina for trafficking methamphetamine. Telling him to come alone did no good. It was like these movies that you see where someone is kidnapped, and replaced with an evil doppelganger, and they have trouble hiding it.
John got to spend one round of holidays with the family. Betty, his mother passed this summer. John took a turn for the worst earlier this week and his brother just called to let me know that he has now passed. The two guys that I hung around most in my younger days are both gone. He was only 62.
When he divorced, he seemed to have problems wanting to work, and never really did after that. I even got a couple of jobs for him. One he quit after two weeks, and one he refused to take, even after I told him that I would fix his car so that he could do it. He also became VERY unreliable. To give an example, when my Mother died, we had a private memorial before the service for the family that I had invited him to and he didn't even show up. He barley made it to the cemetery to be a Pallbearer. The service was almost over, and he arrived with a car full of screaming kids because his ex-wife was "too tired" to keep them while he carried his best friends Mother's casket.
Things went downhill from that time on. His Mother had retired by now, and had a problem with us doing just about anything. She would try her best to interfere in any way possible. That and the fact that his ex-wife also did just about the same thing and he allowed both of them to do it was a big part of the problem.
The beginning of the end, was that three years ago, I was at a local mall, and my Cadillac decided that it was time to act up again and didn't want to start. I was only 15 minutes from home, and had the dumb idea to walk it. I ended up walking through a seedy part of town at dusk, and this group of young people were walking directly towards me, I called him and told him that if he did not hear from me in five minutes, to call the police. I never heard back from him. He had decided to put the phone down and go and eat the Taco Bell that his mother had brought home. He later told me that I shouldn't be upset.
What I am reading there, and I've learned a LOT on the topic the past couple years, is the signs of a mental illness...PTSD or ADHD or something along those lines You dont really know the mental stress that the marriage/ divorce caused him and we all DO handle stress and loss differently. With different tolerance levels. One thing I've learned out of this research study I have been taking part in, is that extreme and prolonged stress DOES re-wire the brain to "work" and "think" and "prioritize" differently than before the trauma that caused the condition. Actual physical changes in the brain.
Look at it this way...if you try to build a sand-castle 10 times, and some bully kicks it over 10 times, you probably wont try for an 11th because you have learned (the brain has been physically wired) for failure at building sand-castles due to the malicious actions of bullies. The interesting part is, you will take that sand-castle lesson and apply it to other areas in life where you see similarities or comparisons to the sand-castle OR the bullies. Why bother, its only going to get kicked down anyway.
The other factor is the fight/flight response. Some people take the "give up" approach, and others decide its time to forget sand castles and go hunting bullies instead. Both ways the castles dont get built but there can be radically different outcomes or consequences for the individual affected.
At least give your buddy the suggestion to look into the area with an expert (which I aint). Some (not all) of the changes ARE reversible but it takes a lot of hard work and the people who can point him in the right direction
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