Sheila Graybeal Sheila Graybeal

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Sheila is a beautiful southern belle both inside and out.  She is affectionately known by her family, friends, and neighbors by many titles - lovely wife, adored stepmother, caring grandma, LaLa to many, Aunt Sheila to others, Bestie to several, and friend to all.  Sheila loves her Lord Jesus Christ and shares that love through her caring and compassionate nature to everyone she comes in contact with.  She is often seen walking Tucker Winston through the neighborhood, always taking time to stop and chat a while and care for the needs of others.  She has a sense of humor that is contagious and uplifting.


In the early morning hours of Thursday, February 21, 2019, she woke her husband Gordon up around 3:30 am and said “I can’t talk.”  That was the last words she said.  She was immediately rushed to Carilion Roanoke Memorial Hospital in Roanoke, VA, where she was diagnosed with a massive hemorrhagic stroke.  Initially doctors said to wait and give the bleeding in her brain time to stop and to see if the body would absorb the clot and begin to heal on it’s own.  However, after three days on a ventilator, it was deterimined through CT scans and her lack of response that the damage had been too severe for her to make a full recovery.  


Throughout the following week in ICU, doctors advised that Sheila  has a zero percent chance of ever walking, talking, feeding herself, or having any quality of life.  The family was faced with two options - either allow her more time to see if she would eventually respond or to put her on a trach and feeding tube and prepare her for a life of 24-hour round the clock care in a nursing care facility.   After much prayer, research, and medical conferences, the family decided to give her a week longer on the ventilator.  


On March 1, the bleed started back up.  On March 6, it was decided that the ventilator needed to be removed.  Sheila has had only minimal delayed response of squeezing her hand or wiggling the toes on her left leg.  The family knows Sheila would not want to continue on life support or tubes for the rest of her life.  Surrounded by her pastor, family, and friends, she was moved to the palliative care unit.   Sheila is a prayer warrior that now  needs to be lifted up in our prayers.  We are waiting on the LORD and asking for a miracle.