THIS ONE’S FOR JENNIE

By Mark Reed

In 1958, as a twelve-year-old boy, my world and that of my family was about to be completely changed forever. Up until the series of events I am about to share, I guess you could say we lived the typical Ozzie and Harriett or Father Knows Best kind of life. That all changed.

My mom, Virginia Lee Pepper Reed, Jennie to her friends, started having terrible migraine headaches. Her doctor, he and his wife close friends of mom and dad, told her not to worry, and prescribed headache medication. They got worse. Her doctor increased the dosage of pain meds. While this was going on, her eyesight was changing, and she needed new glasses. She went to Dr. George Young, her long time optometrist in Smyrna and he gave her new glasses. A month later she returned for a new prescription for glasses. Her eyesight was getting worse. Dr. Young said this was worrisome, and asked her to come back a week later for another examination. When she returned, her eyes were progressively worse. He told her, “Jennie, there is something else going on here. This is not normal. You need to see a neurosurgeon and get x-rays of your head.”

Dad was friends with Dr. Joseph C. Barnett, a renowned neurosurgeon in Marietta, Georgia. He called Joe and set up an appointment for him to see mom immediately and Dr. Barnett had x-rays done at Kennestone Hospital. As soon as he read them, he sat down with mom and dad and told them that mom had a huge brain tumor and that an emergency operation was required or she would not live a week.

That day, December 1, 1958, Dr. Barnett sent mom to Piedmont Hospital, and operated on her the next day, December 2, 1958.

Dr. Barnett told dad privately that it was unlikely mom would survive the operation, as the tumor was so large and had been there for some time. He said that if she did survive the operation, she would probably be in a coma for whatever time she had left. You can imagine how that must have affected my dad. Years later, dad and I had a conversation about all of this, and it was only the second time I saw tears in his eyes – the first was when he put me on the plane when I shipped out in the Army.

I vividly remember mom and dad coming home to pick up a few things on the way to the hospital. Mom took the time to talk to each of us children and explain what was going on and for us not to worry. Of course we did anyway.

We kids were shuttled off to relatives for the duration. My sister, Cynthia, went to stay with Uncle Raymond and her cousins, Debbie and Patricia. I think my brother Bruce must have gone with her to stay with cousin Ray. I was sent to dad’s sister’s home, Becky Reed Leonard, where I stayed with my cousins Pat, Charles and Tommy – Bobby and Johnny had already moved out. I remember loving being with them – it was like having three older brothers. We were close before this, but we became even closer afterwards.

A miracle happened. Dr. Barnett told dad, immediately after the operation that he thought he had been able to get the entire tumor out. He was unsure of what functions she would still have, but she had survived the operation, which had been touch and go, but her vitals were strong. She should survive. A few days later, after mom had regained consciousness, I remember dad taking us to the hospital to see her. I’ll never forget walking into that hospital room and seeing mom in bed with this huge plaster cast covering her head. Bruce, who was only four-years-old, was terrified, saying, “She looks like Frankenstein.” We did not stay long, and I don’t remember if mom actually said anything to us or not, but we were told she would live. Our mom would be coming home.

Dr. Barnett told us that mom was a modern medical miracle. Not only would she survive, but except for the loss of vision in one eye and her sense of smell (not A terrible thing if you think about it), she should be able to live a “normal” life. Normal was not what it was, at least compared to what life had been before. Mom was still the sweet and loving mother she had been before, but she was no longer the dynamo we all knew. She slowed down. She was never totally her old self, but we still had our mom, and dad still had his wife. Our family slowly returned to our life together.

Mom and Dr. Barnett became good friends after this. She had follow-up appointments with him for several years afterwards, until he finally gave her a complete good bill of health. Not only had Dr. Barnett saved her life, so had Dr. Young, her optometrist, by virtue of his diagnosis.

Fast-forward twenty-nine years to June 1987. Dad had died in 1981 at the young age of fifty-nine, but mom was still going strong. Her life was all about her two grandsons, Bill and Lew. Life was good, but was once again about to make a radical change. We noticed some unusual changes in her actions. Most significant was she could be playing with Bill and Lew and just get up and walk out of the room. There were other things that alarmed us so I arranged for her to be seen by her doctor. He immediately set up x-rays at Kennestone Hospital, where she underwent the same x-rays twenty-nine-years before. Same result.

I was told that she had a brain tumor. Totally different from, and unrelated to, the first. This was a bad one, with tendrils spread throughout her brain. She needed surgery immediately.

I had not seen or talked to Dr. Barnett in over twenty-five years. I did not know if he was still practicing. I called information and got the number of his practice in Marietta and called. He remembered me immediately and asked how Jennie was. I gave him the bad news and told him that I wanted him to do the operation. There was a moments hesitation and then he told me he was in the process of retiring and closing his practice.  Another moment’s hesitation, and then he told me that he would put that off and make Jennie his last operation. He said, “Jennie was my favorite patient in all my years of practice.” I can’t tell you how thankful I was.

Mom was scheduled for her operation at Kennestone Hospital on July 6, 1987. On the Fourth of July, the family gathered at our home and as a group we all went across the street with mom to Atlanta Country Club to watch the fireworks display. The next day, I took mom to the hospital.

Dr. Barnett operated on mom and met with me in the waiting room afterwards. He told me he got as much of the cancer as possible, but was unable to get it all. He said there was nothing further that could be done. He told me that she should be able to come home in a week, and may even appear to be doing great at first, but that would only be temporary. He said she would quickly deteriorate and end up bed-ridden and would probably only have a year to live. There was real sadness in his voice and eyes.

Mom had no insurance. She was sixty-three-years-old and was not on Medicare yet. She owned her home and had a little money in the bank, but basically, I was responsible for her medical bills at the Hospital and for Dr. Barnett. I don’t remember the actual total amount due, but memory seems to be it was tens of thousands. It was huge, regardless.

I told Dr. Barnett that mom did not have insurance, but that I was good for the bill. He looked me straight in the eye and shook his head. He said, “This one’s for Jennie.” I think I cried, but maybe I just had something get in my eyes. I contacted the hospital and was told that Dr. Barnett had taken care of the bills. I know he did this for my mom, but he also did it for me and the family. Who does such a thing? A great, kind, loving man, that’s who. Thank you Dr. Barnett.

Mom died on July 5, 1988 at the age of sixty-four, one day short of one year from her operation. By the way, after Dr. Barnett operated on mom, he did not retire until 1996, after thirty-nine-years of practice. He passed away on May 26, 2012, after a relatively brief illness with metastatic lung cancer.

He was a special man. This one’s for Joe.

________

THE REST OF THE STORY

I have dealt with severe neck pain for many years. I have a high pain threshold, thanks to dealing with my many passed kidney stones, but the pain was taking a toll on my life. Some friends of mine finally prevailed upon me to go to a medical pain specialist. As part of his diagnostic process, he referred me to get a MRI of the region of my spine that was affecting my neck. After getting the results of the MRI, my doctor and I sat down in front of his screen and reviewed the images together, him explaining various things he saw. The MRI also happened to encompass an area of my spine a little lower, between my shoulders. As my doctor moved the cursor up and down my spine, he stopped and said, “Uh, what is that?” Actually, what he said was a little more like locker room talk between buddies. I’ll leave it at that, except to say that this is nothing you want to hear from your doctor when looking at your spine, or any other part of your body. He pointed out to me two separate masses on my spine, which he and the radiologist examining the MRI in his notes said were tumors.

My doctor said that he needed to refer me to a neurosurgeon to be checked out. Yeah, I was a little spooked by this diagnosis. Anyway, my doctor finished his examination of my neck where the pain problem emanated, and scheduled a steroid injection via an epidural. The procedure was successful and my pain in the neck went from a nine to a ten down to a one to a three. I can live with that.

In the meantime, I followed up on the referral to the neurosurgeon, Florence C. Barnett, MD at Barnett Neurosurgery in Alpharetta, GA. They had me fill out a whole series of history and questionnaires online, as is usually the case. An appointment was made for March 2020. Then Covid-19 hit. My appointment was cancelled, as were the appointments of many existing condition patients all over the country. That is problematic, but a topic for another time. They rescheduled me for August 2020. This concerned me because that would make it eight months since the tumors were found. I contacted them and explained I was uncomfortable with putting off seeing the neurosurgeon about my condition for so long. They said they would get back to me. I decided to be proactive and went to their office and personally asked for an earlier appointment. They were very nice and said they would see what they could do. They called me soon afterwards and rescheduled it for July 2020.

A few days later I was with some long time friends sharing cigars, drinks, and old memories. Obviously, I shared with them about my tumors. They were familiar with my mom dying from a brain tumor and I shared the above story about Dr. Barnett, my mom’s neurosurgeon. One of my buddies, who I will refer to as The Green Lantern, suggested that I write a Blog Story about Dr. Barnett and my mom. We all agreed that was a good idea. I commented on the fact that my neurosurgeon’s name was also Barnett, and wouldn’t it be a coincidence if she was the daughter of my mom’s doctor. My other buddy, who I will refer to as Captain America, said that he would research that online.

A few days later, through several telephone conversations and back and forth e-mails with The Green Lantern and Captain America, sharing links about various medical topics, Captain America included an article from a medical journal about a daughter who followed in the footsteps of her neurosurgeon father. There was a photo of her with her father, my mom’s Dr. Barnett. Wow. What a small world and a circle of life completing its highly elliptical orbit around my mother and I.

I wrote the first part of this story before my appointment with my Dr. Barnett. I even found my mom’s Dr. Barnett’s prescription admitting her to Piedmont Hospital for her operation. I printed off the story, with a copy of the prescription, and took it with me to my appointment. My wife Michelle and I had discussed what these tumors could mean for me, us, our family and our life. I was remarkably calm about the whole thing, because I had put it in God’s hands. I had also called upon all my prayer warrior friends to lift me up in prayer. My prayer was that my Dr. Barnett would look at the MRI, and tell me that she had seen these a thousand or more times, knew exactly what they were and that they posed no threat to my life.

That is exactly what happened. Don’t tell me prayer does not work!

Dr. Barnett is a lovely person, as well as being a renowned and respected neurosurgeon. After I told her the cliff notes version of my story about her dad and my mom, she was very gracious and excited to receive my story. She opened it and saw the prescription on top, and immediately exclaimed, “That’s my dad’s handwriting.” She went on to discuss that a hand written prescription was how you admitted someone from one hospital to another back in the day. It was a really nice conversation.

At the end, after she completed a full examination of me from a neurological standpoint, she made her final diagnosis: “You are perfectly normal (to a laugh from Michelle), so get out of here before I change my mind.”

A happy ending, to be sure. And that’s THE REST OF THE STORY.

This one’s for Florence.