The Beginning

The impact. A deafening pandemonium of smashing metal and shattering glass. Swirling dust. Then silence. Within seconds, our life as a family changed forever. The day: Sunday morning, June 29, 1958.

In 1954 my husband, Charles, one-year-old Sherida (Sheri), and I moved to Hettinger, a small town in southwestern North Dakota. Charles had gotten his degree in veterinary medicine from Colorado State University, and he was anxious to establish his practice. In the beginning, he set up his medical facilities in our garage. Later he moved to a downtown location and eventually built one of the first large-animal veterinary clinics in North Dakota.

Two years later our daughter Korliss Kay (K-K) was born. We had purchased our first home for $15,000. We had big dreams, and we were definitely on our way to becoming that all-American family.

On that Sunday morning, my husband, our two young daughters, and I decided to visit my father, who lived in the small town of Richardton, North Dakota, seventy-five miles from our home. We planned to leave early so we could attend services with him in the little church where I was baptized and confirmed. While I dressed Sherida in her summer playsuit, she bounced up and down, as did her thick, sand-colored braids.

"Hurry, Mommy, Grandpa will be waiting for us," she said as her large blue eyes, fringed with fur-like ebony lashes, danced with excitement. Sheri's satin-smooth skin, tanned by spring's sun and wind, was the color of toast. She had plump, pink cheeks I loved to kiss and gently pinch. Always inquisitive, her daily "How come?" questions were endless. A determined, beautiful, intelligent, and energetic five-year-old — that was our Sherida.

Two-year-old Korliss Kay, fine-featured with olive skin, dark hair, and huge brown eyes also jumped up and down with excitement as she imitated Sherida. We were going for a ride, and that was enough for her. "Be happy," she said.

When I walked our daughters to the car that morning, I was aware of the sun, shining through the leaves of the trees in our backyard, casting lacelike patterns on the lawn. The morning air was filled with scents of a newborn spring day. We were all in a good mood as we drove along North Dakota Highway 8, listening to soft music on the radio of our 1958 Mercury Club Coupe. I was looking forward to a special day with my young family and my father.

"I'm one lucky woman," I said to Charles.

My husband looked at me and grinned. "You bet your life you are," he said in his usual joking manner. "You're married to me!"

We had driven approximately forty-five miles, passing only an occasional car. Sunday morning traffic in rural North Dakota is almost nil. Then we saw it — the other car — coming over the rise in our lane of the highway, speeding directly toward us. There wasn't time to think, to pray, or to cry out. Charles turned to avoid a head-on collision, but we were hit broadside, our car making a total about-face. It happened within seconds. This was inconceivable. Accidents happened to other people. We were frozen momentarily, and when I looked at Charles, I saw my own hysterical disbelief reflected in his eyes.

"Are you able to move?" he asked.

"I'm fine," I answered shakily. "I can move."

Korliss Kay had been standing on the seat between Charles and me. In 1958, there was no seatbelt law. At the time of the impact, I had clutched her to me. Both of us were partially under the dashboard, but I was grateful she had not gone through the windshield. Though she was crying, she had only a few cuts and bruises.

Simultaneously, we turned around shouting, "Sherida!" No answer. She lay on the back seat with her head turned toward the side of the car that had received the full impact. One small trickle of blood made its way from her nostril to her upper lip, but there were no visible cuts or bruises. On the seat next to her lay the book she had been looking at, opened to page five. She looked as if she were asleep.

Charles, realizing Sherida was not breathing, rushed around the side of the car and gently carried her to a nearby ditch where he began to administer artificial respiration.

My robotic movements were rigid and mechanical as I led Korliss Kay away from the demolished car and the settling dust swirls. The whole scene — our daughter lying in the ditch with her father bending over her, pale and shaky, and both Korliss and me crying — seemed surreal. Like a hypnotized sleepwalker, I felt I would awaken soon from my daytime nightmare.

Dreamlike, I watched the driver of the other car walking unsteadily toward us carrying a can of beer in his right hand. He was bleeding from his mouth and I could see his front teeth were missing. Obviously, he had been drinking.

But now I awakened, the thunder in my heart whipped inside me. I stood looking at him for a few seconds, and then I made an eerie sound. My pain and fear came from deep, deep inside of me and finally erupted into a piercing scream. Seemingly, it came from a far distance and from another person. I ran toward the man, scratching and clawing him until Charles yelled at me to stop. My outburst ended in gasping sobs.

By this time, Charles had gotten Sherida to breathe. Almost immediately, the convulsions started. Her rigid little body quivered with intermittent spasms.

Since the accident occurred near a farm, the family who lived there came to our assistance, offering to call medical help immediately. Dr. Hankins from Mott arrived shortly, though it seemed like an eternity. After he examined Sherida, he said gravely, "This child is in serious condition."

We lifted her gently into a volunteer car and took her immediately to the hospital in Richardton. At the hospital, we paced the floor anxiously for at least an hour. The diagnosis indicated Sherida had multiple skull fractures. She was taken by ambulance at once to the Dickinson airport, twenty-five miles west of Richardton, and then flown to St. John's Hospital in Fargo, North Dakota — the only neurological center in our state.

Everything moved very quickly — perhaps too quickly. The pilot who flew Sherida to Fargo visited us at the hospital later and informed us that because time was so essential, the hurried nurse had forgotten to bring ice or oxygen. Sherida's temperature soared during the flight. Several times she stopped breathing. Not having ice or oxygen during crucial hours may have contributed to her already-apparent, extensive brain damage. Later, Charles wondered if flying the plane at a higher altitude would have lowered Sherida's temperature. We will never know.

Charles's parents, who lived in Dickinson, loaned us their car to make the three-hundred-mile trip to Fargo since there was no room to go with Sherida on the plane. They took Korliss to their home, and I did not see her again for one long month. What anxiety this two-year-old child must have experienced as she witnessed the trauma of a horrible accident, her sister's injury, and the disappearance of her parents in one day.

About 10:30 p.m. we arrived in Fargo, physically and emotionally drained. I prayed only that Sherida would be alive. Charles prayed, if she was alive, she could be as she had been before the accident.

With heavy hearts we entered the hospital and took the elevator to the pediatric ward on the third floor. The neurologist, Dr. Christoferson, met us at the nurses' station.

"Dr. and Mrs. Uecker," he said, "why don't we step into this room where we can talk? Sherida has very severe head injuries. She is in an extremely deep coma and may not live through the night." He explained that she had a temporal-parietal and temporal-frontal fracture with the fracture lines being widely separated due to edema of the brain. Difficult as it was, we were able to see and follow this on the encephalogram he showed us.

"Her temperature upon admission," Dr. Christoferson continued, "was 107.4 degrees and has remained there since her arrival. As a result she may, in addition to her head injuries, develop severe and permanent kidney damage."

I saw his lips move, and I heard him speak words, but I could not comprehend what he said. In my paranormal state, I was aware only of the movement of the white-garbed nurses, like ghosts in the night, all about me.

"Would you like to see your daughter?" Dr. Christoferson asked softly.

He led us to the room and then to the bed where Sherida lay. The sight of her was worse than I imagined. At home Sherida slept in a youth bed. Now as she lay in a standard-sized hospital bed, her lifeless body looked so tiny. My heart tripled its beat. Could it be that only a few hours ago she was laughing, her face rosy with summer's glow? Motionless and pale, her partially opened mouth made no sound. But she was breathing. Tubes and wires covered most of her body, and a catheter led to an empty plastic bag attached to the bed. Reality surfaced. More pain. More panic.

"Sheri, sweetheart, Mommy and Daddy are here. Everything will be all right," I sobbed as I held her hands. We didn't really expect an answer, but how I longed for some small sign of recognition. In the quiet of the night there was only the hum of the many life-support machines. Nurses came. Nurses went.

After an hour or so, one of them suggested we get some rest; both of us were exhausted. As we moved our totally worn-out bodies away from Sherida down that long corridor, I wept. I prayed. I wept. My body trembled with a crushing heaviness previously unknown in my young life.

We checked into a nearby hotel, but there was no sleep for me — only nausea and fear. Any minute the phone could ring. Would they tell us our daughter was no longer alive? The unbound despair of the night, like the weight of a yoke, lay heavy on my body. At last, daybreak. The phone had not rung. Sherida had not died — yet.

The Agony

June 30, 1958: We greeted the dawn with heavy hearts. When we finally summoned enough courage to call the hospital, we were told there was no change in Sherida's condition. She was alive. That was enough for the moment.

Still wearing yesterday's clothing, we made our second visit to St. John's. When we arrived, we were told the present high-tension crisis was the condition of Sherida's kidneys. She had had a bladder infection prior to the accident, which was an additional major complication. Had the prolonged high temperature caused permanent damage? Would kidney failure set in? These were great concerns for the medical staff, and for Charles and me.

Her temperature remained unbelievably high, only lowering slightly while she was in ice packs. During the following two days, we lived by minutes and hours.

On Wednesday morning, four days after the accident, we were coming down the hospital corridor when Sherida's nurse rushed to meet us. From the expression on her face, we knew she had good news this time.

"Sherida's kidneys are functioning!" she said, rejoicing happily with us as our daughter passed the first of her many crises.

There was still concern for the blood remaining in her spinal fluid, which indicated some internal bleeding. Also, her temperature had only dropped from 107.4 to 104.6 degrees in the days she had been hospitalized. Dr. Christoferson informed us that the hypothalamus gland, located at the base of the brain below the cerebellum, and which regulates body temperature, had been extensively damaged.

"Until Sherida's gland functions normally, the continued periodical use of ice bags to regulate her temperature is necessary," he told us. "And there is no way of knowing if the gland will ever be normal again."

During these days Sherida remained in a deep coma. All vital signs were monitored and special nurses were assigned for her around-the-clock care. Each morning, I came to sit with her, often staying the night, always afraid to leave because I feared her impending death. Our hodge-podge days moved slowly.

Though Charles continued to remain with me in Fargo, our friends and family returned to their homes and daily routines, but their calls continued. It was difficult to relate Sherida's condition over and over to them. At first it was a challenge to have a child in a coma. Perhaps someday I could tell our friends and family how we got through this experience and how Sherida just had awakened one morning. "Did you pray a lot?" they would ask me. "Yes — I never quit, and now it's over and Sherida is well," I would answer. Crazy days. Demented thoughts.

Though Sherida continued to live, there was no magic awakening. Each of the following days seemed like a walk through an endless tunnel. I had no routine except to sit by Sherida's bed, talking to her and holding her. Occasionally I ate and slept. I could not even read.

Sherida's vital signs began to improve after the tenth day, but Dr. Christoferson felt that excessive pressure from possible hematomas on her brain could cause her to remain in a deep coma. Twelve days after her accident, he decided to perform exploratory surgery to determine the location of any blood clots.

The night before surgery, Dr. Christoferson explained the surgical procedure he would perform on Sherida. Though these might not be his exact words, I remember his explanation was something like this:

"We will prepare her this evening and operate tomorrow morning at 8:00 a.m. I will make four incisions in her scalp, drill four burr holes through her skull in the four sections of the brain, and then apply air pressure into these holes. Since we know exactly how much air each area of her brain is capable of holding, we hope to locate blood clots in this way. When they are removed, the cranial pressure is relieved. Perhaps this will help your daughter regain some awareness."

I felt a tremor of hope. Some action was being taken. I felt that perhaps — -just perhaps — this would be the turning point, and Sherida would regain consciousness. Charles, because of his medical background, was more aware of the possible trauma ahead of us.

We arrived at the hospital early the next morning, but we were not allowed to see our daughter before the surgery. Minutes dragged into hours as we sat in the waiting room, and with each hour my anxiety increased, as did my headache. I felt like a scalpel was slicing my brain. We prayed. We wept. We paced back and forth. Both Charlie and I drank cup after cup of coffee — and waited — and waited. Approximately eight hours later, though it seemed like days, we heard our name over the speaker: "Dr. and Mrs. Uecker, please report to the front desk."

Turmoil. Terror. Hyperventilation. I trembled as I walked the short distance. Though I wanted to know the outcome of the surgery, part of me was paralyzed with fear, fear of Dr. Christoferson's report. The agony was over or perhaps it was just beginning. When Dr. Christoferson finally came to us, I could only look at him while tears spilled down my cheeks.

"Sherida came through the surgery very well," he said in his soft-spoken voice. "We thought we'd find several clots, but there was only one small one above her left ear, which we removed. We did, however, find extensive swelling of the brain. I'm afraid we have done all we can. The outcome is unclear." He talked some about brain damage: "One thing is certain," he said, "the damaged brain cells are unable to repair themselves as the cells in other body organs. But sometimes healthy brain cells will take over for the damaged ones. With Sherida's extensive head injury, chances are she may never regain normal brain function." He paused and then looked at me directly. "I'm afraid, Mrs. Uecker, that we can't rule out the possibility of impending death. There are still so many complications, you see."

When we were finally allowed to see Sherida, a large, white turban of bandages covered her little head; her thick braids had been cropped off and lay near her bed. Nothing about her looked normal. I had an impulse to crawl into her bed and cuddle her, but there were so many machines, tubes, and wires. Most of all I wanted her to recognize Charles and me, but of course she didn't. Fear from all the sudden and overwhelming changes stunned both of us as we looked at our daughter, but we were grateful she was still alive.

The many cards, letters, and phone calls we received were of great consolation during this trying time. They were my manna. Also, prayers were continually being said for Sherida both in Hettinger and Fort Collins, Colorado, where she was born. Pastor Mel Wendt at the American Lutheran Church in Fort Collins had baptized Sherida. His wife had been Sherida's sitter while I did secretarial work to help Charles through school. They were like parents to us. Now their love and prayers were with us daily. Friends in the Catholic church in Fort Collins and the Catholic church in Hettinger said a Mass for Sherida. And so it went for months. This unceasing love and concern touched my life so much that I felt a need to reach out to others who were hurting, and I knew there were many families with pain such as ours or even greater.