The Stark Family

|Hi, my name is Joyce, and I'm raising money to help my mom Kathy after my Father's recent passing on Thanksgiving Day. They have been married for almost 35 years, and she has been his sole caretaker since he had several strokes about 7 years ago and became paralyzed and bedridden.

On November 15th, she had to call an ambulance to pick him up and take him to the hospital. He was taken to a hospital in Erin, TN. They transferred him to Hendersonville, TN where he was treated for bed sores. They decided he would get better care at Centennial Hospital in Nashville, TN. There, they had to amputate part of his foot. They also had to go in and enlarge the veins to get blood flow back down to his foot. Over the next couple of days, he complained about chest pain. On Thanksgiving Day, the pain got worse. A nurse came in and tried adjusting him, which caused his blood pressure to drop dramatically. They had to pull in a team of nurses, doctors, and the crash cart. They attached the paddles to shock his heart back into sinus rhythm. Once they sent electricity to the paddles, it sparked and caused his oxygen to explode and create a fireball that burned him on his chest, face, head, hands, and back. It also ended up burning his throat and lungs. They told her that had never happened before and there was a faulty wire in the pad. They immediately transferred him to the burn unit at Skyline Hospital in Nashville, TN. Shortly after mom arrived because she could not transport with him, a doctor came out and told her that they did everything they could, but he did not survive.

She was in the room and witnessed everything that had happened to him at Centennial. Not only does she have to deal with the loss of her husband and best friend, but she has to live with seeing and smelling everything that happened to him. She has been his sole caretaker for the last seven years and therefore relied on his Social Security as their only source of income.

Any help would be greatly appreciated while she is forced to make changes that were not even a thought or concern previously.