Hal’s Story

Site created on December 13, 2021

LOCATION ***** 1609 Medical Drive, Room 1127 *****

Many of you may have heard that the Hal was in a horrible car accident on December 3rd coming back from PC to Tallahassee. Hal sustained some serious injuries and after several long surgeries and some time in PC, he was transported back in ambulance to Tallahassee. He has seriously fractured bilateral acetabulum, had a punctured knee and shattered his left wrist.

He has a long road to recovery. He is expected to be inpatient through mid January and will be non-weight bearing once home until mid March. Then it’s time for rehab to get walking again.

Hal is TMH Rehabilitation Center, 1609 Medical Drive. Hal can accept visitors from 8. AM to 7 PM, but please be considerate of his Physical and Occupational Therapy time as it can wear him down. Hal also likes his precious time with his lovely bride Angela and his family visits. We love you Hal! He also asks you DO NOT DROP in.

From Hal- DO NOT DONATE MONEY. This is to keep folks up to date. It is NOT a fundraising site. If you want to help someone with money, find a way to help the amazing folks here at TMRehabilitation. I couldn’t do this without them. They are amazing.

Please only look here for information about visiting. I love having visitors, but we do not want things to get overwhelming. There is nobody but me and Angela it will make decisions about when it is OK to visit. I know many people want to help by choosing to let people know they should not reach out to me, but unless it comes from us, it is not the real deal.

I will control who comes and when. My cell is 850-545-1436. If you want to visit, shoot me a text. Often I will not be able to really tell you until the afternoon the before the day you want to visit, simply because I never know when physical therapy and occupational therapy will be for the next day. Also, please note that well this is not an absolute rule, most weekdays I will stop having people visit by five because Angela is working and that is when she gets to come. We are still newlyweds, and we really like to spend time together. That is the only time we get.

I will be relatively selfish about this. I will not overbook myself, and I expect anybody who wants to come see me to be pretty flexible. Anything can come up. I end up being scheduled last minute for x-rays or MRIs, or specialists come in to see me, or I have to deal with social workers, or the like. So even if I schedule something, it may change.

A lot of people want to bring me things. That is fine. I think there is a place on this Caring Bridge site where I can put wants and needs. That is my next goal. One of my primary reasons for using this is so that I don’t have to reach out to different groups of people to ask for things. It will all be in one place. This has all been a very humbling experience, and we will not hesitate to ask for the things that we need, when we need them.

One thing I ask is to follow through. I do not expect anything from anyone other than their love and support. However, if we need something and you say you are going to get it, please get it or let me know by text right away that things changed so we can get someone else to do it. I have no concern at all about getting everything that I need. I just don’t want to add any stress to my already relatively stressful life right now.

The injuries are pretty bad. Both acetabulums are completely fractured. I am basically trying to heal up through March so I can begin to learn to walk again. We will need help both at the rehabilitation facility and at home. I am sure everybody understands we will need more help at home, so if you want to be on team Hal there will be plenty of time to do so.

The love and support we have had through this is absolutely amazing. I just had a social worker visit and one of the questions she asked was whether I was depressed. I had to think about it. I’ve been depressed in my life. I cannot say I am now. I am frustrated. I am uncomfortable. I am in pain. But I am not depressed. The level of support that we have felt has lifted me way out of any possible depression, and honestly at this point I would feel like it would be a betrayal to take all of the love and still be depressed.

Thank you!

Newest Update

Journal entry by Hal Mardenborough

We got to meet with the team to talk about maybe going home one day in early January.  We may be able to get me out of a bed and into a wheelchair around Christmas. It’s a lot of work and it hurts but I can’t be in this bed forever. I’ve been pinned to this bed like a bug for 19 days now. 

The care continues to be top-notch. Everyone on our floor takes great care of me. I really don’t know how I could do this without them. They are with me when I’m up and they are with me when I’m down. I’ve learned over the last few days that they’ve been with me while I am up even though many of them really did not know what was wrong. A few comments were made where I asked the nurses to just take a look at the x-rays taken a few days after I got here. These are not post accident films; they are post surgery films. I do not think they have access to the 1000+ images that we brought over from a medical center. Those show a lot before the surgeries.

To a person, the facial expressions completely changed and they said they cannot believe how serious it is. I then realized many of them thought I simply had a cracked hip or it was getting hips replaced and I was staying here a bit longer for some reason.  My nurse told me that she really hasn’t seen this kind of injury here before. All of them said that they cannot believe my positive personality when they see how bad the injury is. I have to just remind them that no matter what the injury is, we have to be positive to get the best results and to not go crazy. 

This tracks with what I have heard from some folks recently. I’ve been getting calls or emails suggesting I would be home pretty soon, or even out and about pretty soon. I don’t know who out there thanks this is a basic hip replacement or routine hip injury, but that idea seems to prevail. I wonder if people think I am somehow really just malingering and staying here longer than I need to. Well, malingering is not really the word I would use, but it’s close. I’m not asking for anything, but I do want to make sure people know how bad this is. I am not trying to garner sympathy. I have all the visitors and all the help I can take.  But, while I usually don’t care what people think, I do not want people to underestimate what this is and think I am just lying around. I am not. 
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