Here's a Facebook conversation I had with a woman who had a son in the trauma unit in Vanderbilt at the same time I was there. I just think things like this are cool.


Sandra:
Oh Tyson, where do I begin? I just read your story. My son Brandon was admitted right before you at Vanderbilt's Trauma Unit. You are such an inspiration and I loved reading your story although I tried to keep up with your progress.

I cannot tell you what a blessing your mom, sister, Jenna, and her parents were to me. You know, I give so much to your family for helping me even though we were strangers in the beginning. Camille and Jenna always were so positive and always smiling. Your mom was just unbelievable to me. She went back and forth between you and your dad all the time. You know one thing that just amazed me was your sweet Jenna and some friends all prayed around Brandon's bed, and it amazed me that you were laying there almost dieing, and they took time to pray for Brandon.

Because of where we lived I never left the hospital, so everytime in the middle of the night when I knew your mom had gone home, when I checked on Brandon I would go over and check on you too. When both of you had stabilized you were in rooms next to each other and I would still go in and check on you all the time. When Brandon came out of the coma and we were going to be transferred to Stallworth (he did so good when he woke up we ended up not going to Sheppard's) and he and your dad were there together before your dad was transferred.
One thing that just makes me have tears is when I brought a card over for Jenna and they had you up in the famous neuro chair, you were 'watching' tv and your eyes would be almost open, but yet closed (kinda like a baby does). The DON of the floor told me they didn't expect you to ever be any different than you were at that time. I told you bye that day and said a prayer for you and prayed that He would give you back to your mom, because I knew she needed you and she was so tired.

I saw your mom again at the rehab center and kept up with you until you moved, and then still kept up with your progress through Camille and Jenna. I just wanted to add a little to your story. I am amazed at how much God has blessed all of us. I have shared your story many times with people and the newspaper articles too. I know I will share 'your' personal story with them as well. You and your family have such an amazing story! I will always count them as blessings.

Oh! And in honor of your year anniversary we all celebrated too! We had a cookout for ours and everyone watched your bike riding video! Enough for now. Send hellos and hugs to everyone!


amazing. I never even knew this woman.
Tyson:
This is awesome. Thank you very much for writing this to me. I'm really tempted to put this on my blog too.

Thanks again for taking the time to write this to me. What happened with Brandon? Where is he now?


Sandra:
Brandon is doing great! Where you seemed to have suffered more with physical issues, Brandon's were more mental. His accident had a lot of the same injuries you did, broken ribs, torn spleen, broken shoulder blade, punctured lung...he had a blood vessel that burst down deep at the core of his brain and there was no way to repair it and his skull was shattered. Over 1/2 of his skull was sticking in his brain or just in such small pieces it was almost gone.

When he came out of the coma, he could count to five, but couldn't swallow, walk and all that stuff. He didn't lose his long term memory, but like you he lost some immediate memories. When he woke up he would repeat everything like every few seconds. He had to have almost half of skull 'rebuilt' with a concrete (really) substance and metal plates. His skull was so shattered that the surgeon literally took pieces the size of a pencil lead and put them back together. His recovery went faster after they were able to do the surgery. He didn't talked slurred anymore and his eyes wasn't as dialated as before. The doctors had told us that he would headaches for a couple of years and that he would have to sleep a lot. The brain heals while you are at rest as you know. We were told that when you suffer the type of brain injuries like the two of you did that they usually lost your sense of humor...like you don't get it anymore. His temper is lots worse as they say that patience and tolerence of people and things is a learned virtue from early childhood. He had 0 patience and tolerence lol! He has pretty bad anxiety now in a way that if something didn't work right he would blow up at it. I often wondered if it were because his physical shape changed so drastic. He is 6'5" and weighed 200 when he got hurt. He lost down to about 155 and is now at 185. To look at him you would never think a thing had happened to him now. He had lots of trouble with remembering to do things. He would think he said or did something when he really didn't. Needless to say, I spent a long time trying to stay a few steps ahead of him and remind him of things all the time.

He is great, totally awesome now! He had just graduated high school 10 days before the accident but finally got to go to school the first of January. He was enrolled in automotive school, something that was his natural passion, and didn't forget anything! You know I was doing the happy dance when he started school a few weeks ago! When we were still going to Bill Wilkerson they would go get starters and car parts for him to take apart and try to put back together as part of his therapy.

He is great though! Just as you are great! It is still an overwhelming feeling to me that our God is so good and what he has done for all of us. I will add you on FB so you can see the pictures of him!
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Thanks for letting me share this. I'll ask everyone to continue to pray for him, because I feel like I know better than anyone that he is not out of the woods yet. And please don't let it stand in your way that "I don't even know the guy, why should I pray for him?" I had people all over this world praying for me. God just loves to hear voices calling out to him for people we know need his grace, truth, and love.

Again with the whole website thing, as I get free time every now and then I would like to add stuff to this. I'll keep the "home" page as my own thing, but I'll add more to this page. Thanks again.