Page 9 - March 2014 Catalyst
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THE TRUST FACTOR
By Gladys Grimaud
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that this orthopedic doctor had been the team surgeon for the Minnesota Vikings football team! Eight-year old Greg was put into traction lying at on his back for fourteen days!
I will never forget the anxiety on Greg’s face after one of our well-meaning friends who had visited left the hospital room, “Mom, am I going to be deformed for the rest of my life?” is visitor had carelessly commented that his cousin broke his arm
swings. He asked Greg, another boy whose name was Mike, and me. Pat told Greg to ip when he was halfway in the air. Greg was my 8-year old brother and I didn’t try to stop him. But when he was halfway up, he ipped and let go of the chain attached to the seat of the swing. He landed on his back.
At rst I didn’t think he hurt himself but then he started screaming ‘My arm’s bro- ken!’ en Pat said, ‘It is!’ en I took a look and it looked like Greg’s bone was
“Trust is a precious commodity in one’s life, and if the trust factor is lost, then a valuable character asset is dissolved that is not easily gained back.”
sticking out. What made it look like that was that there was a big bump on Greg’s skin’”
David also told us that night that Greg had successfully completed one ip and was on his second try when the accident happened. What Joe, David, and I did not know was that we had just entered the rst phase of a journey that would last fourteen months and would require the trust factor all along the way.
Greg was rst taken to Ramstein Air Base Hospital, but the doctor there did not think he could handle such a com- plicated fracture. He referred us to the orthopedic surgeon at Landstuhl. e trust factor began to build when we heard
at the elbow and now had a deformed arm. With a shaky heart and a steel upper lip, I had to reach deep inside for the trust fac- tor again, “No, Greg. e doctor says that is not going to happen to you.”
After Greg left the hospital, his arm was in a semi-cast that he wore in a sling around his neck. Several weeks elapsed before his arm was taken out of the semi-cast, and when it was, his arm did look deformed! He could not extend his left arm out in a straight line as he could the right arm. Al- though the doctor could not be absolutely sure that Greg’s arm would return to nor- mal, he believed that eventually it would. However, that would take time, maybe a year. e trust factor had to be there for us
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march 2014
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