Send a card to Jessie this Christmas.

A devastating attack left Jessie with permanent life-long injuries.

I have worked with students with cognitive and physical disabilities, some the result of trauma.  While doing my practicum at the hospital-school facilities of GF Strong in Vancouver, I witnessed young people recently diagnosed with head trauma who received temporary education there.  Over the years I have found the brain to be both incredibly sensitive to trauma and remarkably resilient to it.  The fact is, though, that healing does not always mean full recovery.

Such is the case for Jessie Simpson.  In June of 2016, he was a high school graduate with his whole life ahead of him.  A young man with promise and potential, he was out celebrating his accomplishments when he was viciously attacked with a metal baseball bat.  A blow to the head left him in a coma.  You can see a news report about him here.

His recovery after the trauma has been slow and he has no short-term memory.  He has suffered strokes and seizures and lives with pain daily.  Although the courts awarded the family seven million dollars they have not seen a penny of it as the felon responsible has sold his property to his own parents for the tidy sum of $1.00.  Jessie gets very little joy out of life, but he does love reading Christmas cards.  Every year hundreds of cards come to the home where Jessie can spend part of his day reading and looking at them.

You can mail a card to Jessie at this address:

Jessie Simpson    PO Box 233   Sayona, BC   VOK 2J0

Thanks for reading.

Eric Svendsen   www.ericspix.com 

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