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Support of Capt. Trevor Greene.

No question.....just a comment

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    Votes: 8 80.0%
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    Votes: 2 20.0%

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An update - sounds like it's still an uphill push.  Thoughts and prayers to the family....

Shared in accordance with the "fair dealing" provisions, Section 29, of the Copyright Act - http://www.cb-cda.gc.ca/info/act-e.html#rid-33409

Captain Greene's toughest mission
Mark Hume, Globe & Mail, 21 Oct 06
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20061021.GREENE21/TPStory/National
or
http://milnewstbay.pbwiki.com/79243

VANCOUVER — Debbie Lepore was lying in bed with the darkness of night starting to soften and cold showers falling on the city when she heard someone at the door.

She knew immediately what it meant. Her man was in Afghanistan. And there in the darkness, before the phone started to ring incessantly, before the haunting images began to flicker across the television screen with news reports, she knew.

Something terrible had happened to Captain Trevor Greene, the big, good looking, athletic writer and soldier she had met five years earlier, to whom she was engaged, and with whom she had recently had a baby girl, named Grace.

“It was about 6 or 6:30 in the morning. Saturday. March 4th,” she said in an interview from Vancouver General Hospital this week, where she goes daily.

Related to this article

Lieutenant Trevor Greene, of Vancouver, B.C., is seen in this undated photo.

“There was a knock on the door. You know instantly what it is.”

She'd had that premonition once before, months earlier, when Canadian military officers had come to her Vancouver home to tell her Capt. Greene, 41, had suffered minor injuries in an attack on an armoured vehicle he was in.

“I had a sense it was more serious this time,” she said.

And it was. Capt. Greene, a man who friends say always wanted “to do good,” a champion of the downtrodden who wrote books about the missing women of Vancouver's Downtown Eastside and the homeless in Japan, was struck in the head with an axe when he sat down with Afghan villagers to talk about how to get clean water for their homes and farms.

A member of a military unit known as CIMIC, for Civilian-Military Co-operation, Capt. Greene had taken off his helmet as a sign of trust and respect.

He was attacked from behind, suffering a deep head wound that put him in a coma for weeks, and which, nearly eight months later, has left him confined to a hospital bed. His attacker was shot dead.

Capt. Green was not the first Canadian soldier to be injured in Afghanistan, but the attack on him shocked Canadians — perhaps because its nature brought home to them the reality that this was a mission like no other, where violence and treachery could come from anywhere, without warning.

Ms. Lepore held her breath and opened the front door.

“I can't recall what was said. I can't even remember who was there. One was a military padre,” she said.

She laughed at herself for forgetting the details. “I don't know if it was the shock or maybe it's just that so much has happened since then. But the details are gone.”

A lot has happened since then, as Capt. Greene has begun a second mission – one at least as challenging as anything he faced in Afghanistan – where the goal is simply to get well, get whole again.

In that moment, Ms. Lepore's life was also changed dramatically. She went from having a busy, orderly life filled with raising Grace and crunching numbers for the Catalyst Paper Corp., to one that has submerged her in the medical world of head trauma and rehabilitation.

“I am the type of person who just gets immersed in it,” she said. “I have to learn everything about it to the point where I sometimes catch myself using medical jargon to friends who have no idea what I'm talking about.”

Within 24 hours of hearing of the attack, she was en route to a hospital in Landsthul, Germany, accompanied by Capt. Greene's parents and Canadian military escorts, who have stayed in touch with her almost daily since then.

“When I first saw him he was in a medically induced coma,” she said. “But he looked like his old self. Except for the swelling (from his head wound). I felt right then he was going to make it.”

In the months since then, Capt. Greene's family and friends have maintained a constant vigil, praying that one day he will be fully recovered.

For now, it remains a struggle where progress is measured in the simplest movements, a smile, or a few words, a gesture with a hand.

He is mostly confined to a bed at Vancouver General Hospital. His family and friends visit him daily.

Ms. Lepore or others take turns holding up a newspaper for him to read, or reading to him from books.

He does crossword puzzles with the help of friends. Sometimes he sends messages on a BlackBerry (a friend types; he presses send) or has brief conversations. Talking is difficult because he has had a tracheotomy, a surgical procedure to open his wind pipe, which leaves his throat dry.

Ms. Lepore works daily with him on physical rehabilitation, moving his limbs, helping him from his bed to sit in a chair, massaging his atrophied muscles. And every day she gives him a Chinese herbal footbath.

Although progress is slow, she said, he has been showing great signs of recovery, regaining his sense of touch – and his famous sense of humour.

“You can make him laugh and it's great when he does,” she said.

One day a nurse commented on his ability to drink lots of water.

“You should see me drink beer,” he said.

There is no official prognosis. His head injury was severe and doctors don't know how far he can go in recovery, or how fast. But Ms. Lepore, other family members and friends who have visited him all say the same thing.

If anybody can make a come back from this, it's Trevor, or ‘Bubba' as he's known to his closest friends.

Ms. Lepore said her faith in his ability to recover was shaken only once, early at Landsthul, when he slipped from medically stable to unstable.

“We did a lot of praying that night,” she said. “And the next day he bounced back and was stable – and I have never doubted since then. I really believe in positive energy and I have nothing but positive thoughts. As my grandmother says, ‘Why worry about what might not happen?' I just believe everything's going to be good, everything is going to work out.”

Ms. Lepore isn't alone in that approach. Shortly after news of the attack on Capt. Greene, a network of his friends, alerted by e-mails, text messages and phone calls, gathered at his favourite Vancouver beach, Jericho. About 50 people came out in a lashing rainstorm to share stories about the rugby player and reserve soldier who stepped up when the call to Afghanistan came — because he thought he could help bring peace to a war-torn area where people deserved better.

“We just wanted to send out positive energy,” said Barb Stegemann who helped organize that spontaneous gathering. She has been a friend of Capt. Greene's since they went to school together at University of Kings College, in Halifax, in the 1980s, where they were both in the rowing program and shared a mentor who encouraged them to “serve the homeless and those who were unprotected in society.”

Ms. Stegemann described him as a remarkable man with a passion for life and a deep feeling of compassion for those in need.

Striving to establish his credentials as a writer, he took on difficult subjects where he could give a voice to those who had none in mainstream society.

That same attitude led him to become a CIMIC officer, where he could work on helping “the average Afghan,” get basic things like food, water and schools.

Ms. Stegemann described Capt. Greene, renowned for his athletic skills as a rugby player and rower, as a big man, 6 feet 7 inches, with a gentle soul and gregarious personality.

“I really think it's important to convey the fact that he's always been a protector of people. I always used to tease him about his white horse he comes charging in on. But he's always looked out for people that are being bullied or harmed. I remember in university he would go across the campus to ensure that a girl got across safely, even if he didn't know her. He wouldn't let someone leave an event and walk alone. I always thought that was remarkable for a young man to be so protective of people. I think that really testifies as to why he went to Afghanistan, to ensure that the people there are heard and that they feel protected. I think that connects and loops back to everything else that he is.”

Ms. Stegemann said she was shocked when a phone call alerted her to Capt. Greene's injury, and she didn't know what to expect when she first visited him at the hospital. But after seeing the recovery he's made so far she believes he's going to prevail.

“Doctors have said you don't see injuries like this very often. Dealing with an injury like that is new ground. But he's remarkably strong, incredibly strong, to be with us still after that severe attack. He's on his own healing journey and he has successes every day and for that we're grateful,” she said.

Robyn Gibson, another friend from college, said he was “shaken and terrified” when he heard of the attack but quickly his fears gave way to a feeling of confidence.

“To get in there and see him and see that infectious smile, to see those bright eyes, was just to reassure me what I know, which is that Trevor will make a full recovery,” he said.

Mr. Gibson recalled an outing he had with his friend before he went to Afghanistan. Out of the blue Capt. Greene called up to say he wanted to go bike riding. But Mr. Gibson, “a Lance Armstrong wannabe” warned him off, saying he'd be taking a high performance bike on a gruelling, high speed ride out around the University of B.C. campus and Vancouver International Airport.

Capt. Greene, he said, showed up on an old mountain bike, wearing flip flops – and proceeded to stick with him for the whole ride.

“He's just not a quitter,” he said, laughing at the memory. “It just never occurred to him to turn back.”

“This will tell you something about him,” he added. “ I think his greatest disappointment to finding himself in that hospital is that he won't finish his mission. I know that sounds crazy, but this is a guy who believes in the Canadian mission, who believes in the UN . . . if he regrets anything it's that he didn't complete the job.”

Richard Greene, Capt. Greene's father, agreed with that assessment.

One of the first things his son asked doctors when he regained the ability to talk was when he'd be able to go back to Afghanistan.

Mr. Greene, a retired RCMP officer, said he thought he knew his son well before the accident, but has learned more about him since, by listening to his large circle of friends talk about the life he led.

He and his son have particularly enjoyed the company of Capt. Greene's former rugby teammates from the Vancouver Rowing Club.

“They have left rugby balls and rugby shirts all over the hospital room,” he said. “They are a rowdy bunch. And Trevor just loves seeing them.”

On the field Capt. Greene was a big, physical player and it is frustrating for him to be bedridden, Mr. Greene said.

Last month Capt. Greene went through a second round of head surgery, after earlier operations in May. Since then, Mr. Greene said, there has been noticeable improvement.

“His motor skills were very severely damaged. But he can move his arms and fingers and hands. The reconnections are taking place and he's able to do a heck of a lot more now than he did in July.”

“He wants to come back. We know that,” Mr. Greene said. “It's now up to us to bring him back.”

When he says “us,” he means Capt. Greene's family, his large circle of friends, his military supporters, doctors, therapists – and the thousands of Canadians who have sent messages of support and prayer.

But mostly he means his son's fiancée, Ms. Lepore, who Capt. Greene planned to marry on his return from Afghanistan.

Friends describe her as “an angel” who brings a sense of hope with her on every visit to the hospital.

Ms. Lepore said the greatest motivator both for her and Capt. Greene, is their bubbly, 21-month-old daughter.

“Grace is always happy. She's a joy for us both,” she said.

Capt. Greene will soon be able to leave the hospital and the family is searching for a rehabilitation facility that is experienced with handling patients with such severe brain injuries.

Ms. Lepore said that will probably require leaving B.C. and perhaps Canada. She will have to quit her job, leaving a company that has been “incredibly supportive.”

But she won't hesitate to pack up and move both herself and Grace.

“Wherever he goes, we go,” she said. “We're his team.”


 
Good show Trevor.

http://www.canada.com/globaltv/bc/story.html?id=8f73cf7b-2cdb-4929-b178-6bf2b0f3b910&k=52512
 
Now this is a story which deserves to be told!

For once, the media delivers story full of human interest, emotion and hope.

To have such support from the overall CF community, his family, friends, and an obvious strong and dedicated fiance, who never gave up. Thats really the best news, infact the best news I have truly enjoyed since I have been here.

With all the carnage here (especially yesterday's), this news has put a smile on my face.

Its still an up hill battle for him, but at least there is light at the end of the tunnel now.

Best of luck to CAPT Greene for a speedy recovery!


Regards from Baghdad,


Wes
 
daftandbarmy said:
http://www.canada.com/globaltv/bc/story.html?id=8f73cf7b-2cdb-4929-b178-6bf2b0f3b910&k=52512

from that article :

Lepore, who is not one to complain, says she is having a difficult time getting proper therapy for Trevor. "He's only given 30 minutes of physiotherapy sessions at a time," she says. "He has had virtually no speech therapy for most of the time that he's been in hospital."

"I've been playing telephone and e-mail tag with military officials in Ottawa to find out why they're not providing more help. As I write this, I still don't have an answer."
 
I recall seeing Capt Greene around the HQ, and I was involved in his predeployment medical processing, but that's as far as my personal connection with him has gone. I do know several of the staff on his ward (including a PRes Nursing Officer and his case manager), and several of the CFHS Gp staff who are responsible for his care, as well as many of his neighbors, friends, and members of his Regimental Family.

Initially I thought this was a great article, although I did notice the author took the chance to make a couple of digs at the CF, and thereby reduced my opinion enormously.

Capt Greene is, from what I've been told, like many other victims of traumatic brain injuries, unable to tolerate more then 30 minutes of physio at a time.  It's not for a lack of support; DND is augmenting his ward with several staff dedicated to looking after him, along with the other fantastic staff at one of BCs finest health care facilities.  While I'm sure his family and friends, and he himself, would like to see faster progress, sometimes it's just not medically possible for that to happen.

Any other comments will be straying outside my lane of personal knowledge of his care and rehabilitation, so I'll stop there, except to say that I wish him, and all our wounded, as speedy and complete a recovery as can be, and the best for their families and friends.

DF
 
I wish him and his family all the best, and a speedy recovery.  :salute:
 
It seems there's going to be a fundraiser for Capt Greene in Vancouver on 26SEP07, according to a friend of mine who went to school with him:

http://www.genx40.com/archives/2007/september/afundraiserfor

Apparently you can also donate by PayPal - just follow the links in the post at GenX.

My guess is that they wouldn't be asking for help if they didn't need it.
 
A little more of the latest (it looks like some of the speech therapy came through), shared with the usual disclaimer - highlights and embedded links mine....

Afghan axe-attack victim's recovery slow but sure
Lena Sin, CanWest News Service, 30 Sept 07
Article link

VANCOUVER -- The flutter in Capt. Trevor Greene's legs last week may seem infinitesimal, but it's the first sign that the B.C. soldier and former journalist, author and entrepreneur may one day walk again.

"He is so determined," says Debbie Lepore, Greene's fiancee. "His main goal is walking. We're a long, long, long way off from that, but that's his main goal."

A year and a half ago, Greene was at a meeting with Afghan village elders when he took off his helmet and laid down his weapon out of respect. Moments later, a crazed teen leapt out of the crowd and buried an axe deep into Greene's head. His fellow soldiers shot the attacker dead.

The brutal blow left Greene immobile and unable to speak, but his cognitive capacity remained intact. Now, sheer determination is seeing him through his mission of recovery.

Remarkably, Greene, 42, wants Canadians to know that he'd go back overseas in a heartbeat.

"We cannot give in to terrorists," he says in a barely audible whisper. He staunchly believes that success is possible in Afghanistan, that Canada needs to stay the course but adds: "It's time for another NATO country to step up and take the lead."

Greene was speaking from his sun-drenched clinic room in Ponoka, Alta., with a Superman blanket, a gift from Lepore, pulled over his bed.

In July, the couple and their two-year-old daughter, Grace, left Vancouver for the small town, 95 kilometres south of Edmonton, so that Greene can receive the best brain injury care in the country at the Centennial Centre for Mental Health and Brain Injury.

For the military reservist who has had a varied career as a journalist, business consultant and author of three books, the victories do not come easily.

But already, there's progress. Last October, after months of silence, Greene whispered his first words. Today, his voice is back to normal at least 20 per cent of the time. In December, his feeding tube was taken out and, as of March, he no longer needed a tracheostomy tube.

He has regained some promising movement in his left arm and, as of last week, some tiny - but definite - movement in his legs and torso muscles.

"It's so slow," Lepore says, but it's progress.

"And all these little things are going to be adding up. He's definitely improved since he's been here at the centre. It's exciting to see all these incremental improvements because they will add up to maybe him sitting up on his own or him feeding himself on his own."

At the brain injury clinic, Greene's week is packed with therapy as he tries to rewire his brain.

"Everything for him is just repetition and getting better at it and for his brain to reconnect all the things he used to do," says Lepore.

While the military is covering medical costs, friends and family can't help but worry about the couple's financial future.

To be by her fiance's side, Lepore had to quit her part-time accounting job in Vancouver. There's no telling how long the family will need to stay in Alberta.

Last week, friends and family in Vancouver showed their support by holding a fundraiser to help the Greene family cope with expenses not covered by the military.

Greene's friend, Rob Gibbs, admits it was difficult seeing Greene for the first time in hospital last year.

The man then confined to a bed 24 hours a day had worked as a reporter in Japan for seven years while authoring a book on the homeless and another on the women missing from Vancouver's Downtown Eastside.

"If he could stand up and walk out of that hospital the first thing he'd do is put on his army gear and head back to Afghanistan," said Gibbs. "He's just a humanitarian. It's always about somebody else, he's always trying to help somebody else."

In keeping with his social activism, Greene's role in Afghanistan was that of co-operation officer, in which he met with village elders to hear about their problems.

But, even today, Greene remains modest.

"I'm just a soldier, I'm not a hero," he says. "The heroes are being scraped off the battlefields."



Donations to the Trevor Greene trust fund can be made to CIBC account No. 39-31137, bank No. 010 and transit No. 00500.

Vancouver Province

lsin@png.canwest.com

 
I stopped in to see him there in August, so can confirm what they say in the article. Great sense of humour, still. Debbie is fantastic. First class facilities and care. I came away wondering if I and my family could do as well as those folks under similar circumstances.

A great example to us all if there ever was one.



 
Thanks for the update.  It's good to hear that there is progress.
 
Didn't see this posted elsewhere on the forum.  Reproduced under the Fair Dealings Provisions of the Copyright Act.

http://www.thechronicleherald.ca/Front/977759.html

Counting his blessings

By CAPT. TREVOR GREENE
Sat. Nov 10 - 8:25 AM

EDITOR'S NOTE: This is Capt. Trevor Greene’s first article since he was severely wounded by the Taliban. His recovery from an axe wound to the head is being hailed as a miracle by his physicians. The Nova Scotia native is undergoing rehab in Alberta with his fiancée, Debbie Lepore, and daughter Grace at his side.

I DIDN’T see it coming but I’m sure I felt it when a Taliban soldier snuck up behind me and split my head open with an axe.

I was attending a shura, a meeting of elders, outside Kandahar city. I had taken my helmet off out of respect for the elders, a practice that we all followed at that time.

Only the quick reaction and lightning reflexes of Capt. Kevin Schamuhn of the 3rd Battalion of Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry, who shot my attacker down, prevented him from landing a second blow. Capt. Schamuhn saved my life.

After the attack came two spells in hospital starting with almost two weeks in Landstuhl, Germany, followed by 13 months in Vancouver General Hospital, followed by ongoing intensive rehabilitation by the professionals at the Centennial Centre in Alberta.

I went to Afghanistan because I was disturbed by images of desolation, poverty and oppression and I was proud Canada stepped up to the plate to fight the Taliban.

All I remember of Afghanistan is dust and heat. I left Canada on Jan. 19, 2006, and was attacked on March 4.

I’m honoured to say that I’ve had many visitors both military and civilian, including the chief of defence staff, Gen. Rick Hillier; my commanding officer, Lt.-Col. Rob Roy MacKenzie; the ultimate man in motion, Rick Hansen; Eric McCormack, star of Will and Grace; and former defence minister Bill Graham.

The Canadian Forces have been both generous and thoughtful, starting with the visit from Gen. Hillier and continuing with the appointment of assisting officers; Mike Larose and Dave Gilmour in Vancouver and Steve Basaraba and Colin Coutts in Edmonton.

Remembrance Day for me now is very vivid and real. Some of my colleagues and friends aren’t coming back from Afghanistan.

We have to go the distance and deny the terrorists a base of operations from which to spread their poison. The Canadian army and its first-rate soldiers have honourably fought the Taliban to a standstill. Our NATO partners will no doubt handle their lead role with equal aplomb.

When I was growing up, I remember putting up flags on the lawn for Remembrance Day and attending parades. As a young boy, I didn’t fully understand the meaning of the day. My father, Richard Greene, a retired RCMP staff sergeant, would stand at attention with fingers curled, thumbs pointing down the seams of his trousers, honouring his father, Enoch Greene, a member of the 108th Battalion (New Brunswick) of the Canadian Expeditionary Forces in the First World War. I gradually came to learn that Canada was honouring its war dead.

I’m in a wheelchair now. My elbows and wrists ache from being clenched at night, and my hands don’t work. As I dictate this, my voice is at the level of a whisper, much improved, I’m told, from earlier communication via eye blinks. I’m on painkillers and sleeping pills. I have dents in my skull and double vision, but my eyes aren’t crossed, my speech isn’t slurred and I don’t drool. I am one of the lucky ones.

I came home to the love and support of a beautiful, incredible woman, my fiancée, Debbie Lepore, and our baby girl, Grace Greene. I am looking forward to spending the rest of my days with them and the large group of friends who have been steadfastly supportive.

I will eventually heal, however, and I dedicate this column to those who have fallen.

Well done, sir.  May you continue to recover and enjoy all that life has to offer.
 
CAPT Greene's recovery has been a slow road, but each day he improves, and with the support from us 'green skins', and the overall goodness of Canadians at large, it makes things all the better.

The lady in his life has done so much, and she too deserves recognition for her 'duty' above and beyond the call.

One day down means on day closer to a better recovery overall.


Hats off to both CAPT Greene, and Ms Lepore!


Wes



 
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