A Kind of Grace

by Jackie Joyner-Kersee

  Initially, my parents didn't want me to play basketball because they considered it unfeminine. They changed their minds when they realized how much I enjoyed it and everyone told them how good I was. PHOTO BY JAMES A. FINELY/FROM THE AUTHOR'S COLLECTION

  My mother, Mary, gave birth to me when she was only eighteen. That's the age I was when this photo of us was taken at a reception honoring me and my Lincoln High teammates for winning the 1980 girls' state basketball championship. People often said she and I looked like sisters. FROM THE AUTHOR'S COLLECTION

  I started leaping off my front porch for fun when I was in grammar school. But when I broke the state girls' long jump record in high school, I realized athletics could take me much further than my front porch. PHOTO BY JAMES A. FINLEY/FROM THE AUTHOR'S COLLECTION

  My father, Alfred (standing, third from the left), was always concerned about my safety. But he knew I was in good hands with my high school track coach, Nino Fennoy (standing, second from the left), who turned me into an athlete and stoked my ambitions. Standing beside Mr. Fennoy and my father on the left, at one of our track meets, is assistant coach Charles McDonald. My basketball coach, Ernest Riggins, stands on the right. Seated below them on the left is coach Theodora Ash Smith. PHOTO BY JAMES A FINLEY/FROM THE AUTHOR'S COLLECTION

  My mother did exercises every night to maintain her hourglass figure and was always the picture of health. But she died suddenly during my freshman year in college. When I got the news, I clutched the frame holding this photograph of her as I cried in my dorm room. FROM THE AUTHOR'S COLLECTION

  In addition to refining my basketball skills, UCLA women's basketball coach Billie Moore (pointing) gave me plenty of emotional support after my mother's death. COURTESY OF THE UCLA ATHLETIC DEPARTMENT

  My brother, Al, has always loved the spotlight. When he won the gold medal in the triple jump and I won the silver in the heptathlon at the 1984 Olympics, he basked in the attention. PHOTO BY JAMES A. FINLEY/FROM THE AUTHOR'S COLLECTION

  Over time, Bobby Kersee became my confidant as well as my coach. During a trip to Japan for a track meet in 1982, as a joke I told a woman who was flirting with him that Bobby was my husband. Four years later, it was no joke. DUOMO PHOTOGRAPHY/FROM THE AUTHOR'S COLLECTION

  My parents' marriage was rocky, and for several years after my mother died, I was angry with my father. But we eventually reconciled. PHOTO BY TONY DUFFY/COURTESY OF ALLSPORT

  My joy over winning the heptathlon gold medal and setting a world record at the 1988 Olympics was quickly shattered by speculation that I used performance-enhancing drugs. PHOTO BY TONY DUFFY/COURTESY OF ALLSPORT

  I got off to a flying start during the long jump at the 1991 World Championships … PHOTO BY TONY DUFFY/COURTESY OF ALLSPORT

  … But I was nagged by ailments. Al and Bob Forster, my physical therapist, had to help me walk off the field because I twisted my ankle en route to winning. PHOTO BY TONY DUFFY/COURTESY OF ALLSPORT

  Eventually, an injury did me in at the 1991 Worlds. I was forced to withdraw from the heptathlon after pulling my hamstring during the 200 meters. PHOTO BY TONY DUFFY/COURTESY OF ALLSPORT

  For too many years, I didn't take my asthma condition seriously. But by 1995 I'd learned my lesson. As much as I hated wearing this breathing mask during the 800 meters at the U.S. Championships, I also knew the pollen in the air that day could trigger a fatal attack if I didn't. PHOTO BY KIRBY LEE/THE SPORTING IMAGE

  Monica Seles and I have been through a lot together since she hired Bobby to improve her strength and conditioning in 1993. I consoled her while she recovered from being stabbed, and she was with me and Bobby the night I almost died during an asthma attack. Here we are, healthy and happy, in 1995 with Sheryl Swoopes at a Women's Sports Foundation dinner. COURTESY OF VALARIE FOSTER

  What was meningitis? It sounded so gruesome. How could it have overtaken her so fast? Had someone made a mistake? Had she suffered? Had she said anything? I kept imagining her in the ambulance and then in the hospital bed. The picture wouldn't leave my mind. It tormented me.

  My racing thoughts turned to the rest of my family. Della sounded awful. How was Al taking the news? I should have called him, but I didn't think of it. How were Angie and Debra coping? Were they with Momma when it happened? Where was Daddy? What was going to happen to us now?

  Mostly, I wondered why this had happened to my mother, after all she'd been through in her life. Was God punishing me by taking her away? I replayed in my head that conversation with her about not coming home for Christmas. She was so sad about my not coming home. If I could just go back in time … make a different choice. I should have followed my heart and gone home. But no, I had to act like I was so strong, pretending not to be homesick.

  Endlessly, I berated myself for making the decision I had. I'd missed out on Christmas and forfeited the opportunity to be with my mother one last time, all because I'd been too proud. Now, she was unconscious, hanging to life by the thinnest of threads. An overpowering sense of regret washed over me. I'd never been so sad and so sorry about anything.

  The sun was setting as the plane touched down at Lambert Field, the St. Louis airport. It was about 5:30 in the afternoon when my aunt Marcella greeted me at the gate. She was dabbing away her tears with a tissue.

  As we drove to East St. Louis, I stared blankly out the window into the distance. Cars, buildings and road signs whizzed past, but I noticed none of it. I was lost in my sorrow.

  The temperature outside was right around freezing when we stepped out of the car at the hospital parking lot. An ache burned inside my stomach. As we rushed through the sliding glass door and entered the hospital, my throat and eyes started burning as well. I wanted to go straight to Momma's side. But Joyce wanted to talk to me first.

  The despair was palpable as the elevator doors opened to the fourth floor. Most of the nurses and orderlies who worked with my mother had gathered on the floor after their shifts ended at 3:00 that afternoon to hold a vigil. Marcella walked beside me and put her arm around my shoulder as we greeted Eva Wren, Helen Sandkuhl, Eula McKinley and Eula Royer and the rest of Momma's friends on our way to a small room at the end of the hall. Although there were dozens of people standing around the nurses' stations and milling around the hallways, it was strangely quiet on the floor. Everyone was still dressed in their white, green and blue hospital uniforms. They all wore name badges and sad expressions. Most of them looked just like I felt: grief-stricken and dazed.

  It was the same way in the crowded room at the end of the hallway where the rest of the family was waiting. As I walked in, I forced a smile to my lips. I don't know why I thought it was necessary to smile. I couldn't keep it up for long. The first face I saw was Al's. He'd been at a track meet when he got the news. Della, Al, Debra and Angie ran to me. We hugged and cried. I also hugged my mother's uncles, Albert and Joseph Rainey. Everyone had bloodshot eyes from crying all day. Daddy was there, too. Rev. Owens was consoling us when Momma's doctor, Dr. Rene Julien, and Joyce came into the room. Joyce walked over to the couch and stood beside us. Her eyes were red but she was completely composed.

  “What happened? When can I see Momma?” I said.

  “Your mother developed a really bad bacterial infection,” Dr. Julien said. “We think it was meningitis, but we're not positive.”

  Dr. Julien said she started running a very high fever as the bacteria infected her and quickly spread throughout her body. She'd experienced a lot of bleeding internally and externally and it had caused swelling all over her body. He told us she was on a respirator, which was keeping her body alive. “She's suffered irreversible brain damage,” Dr. Julien said. “Her body is still functioning, but essentially, she's dead. I'm really sorry. There was nothing we could do.”

  Joyce looked at all of us. “When you go in to see her you'll see that she has a pulse. But the machines she's connected to are the things keeping her body going. Mary can't do it for herself because her brain is dead.”

  I'd been nur
turing the irrational hope that my mother had a chance to recover. But Joyce's and Dr. Julien's words foreclosed any possibility that we'd all wake up from this nightmare and Momma would be alive again. For everyone standing there, Joyce's words were like the irrevocable locking of a door. The Mary Joyner we all knew—my mother, and my life's greatest inspiration—was gone.

  Angie and Debra, sitting on opposite sides of Al, burst into tears and collapsed into his arms. They were completely consumed with grief. I just wanted to see my mother's face one last time.

  “Can I see her?” I asked.

  “Yes, but first I need to prepare you for what you're going to see when you go in the room,” Joyce said.

  I couldn't take much more of it. The bad news just wouldn't end.

  “Your mother doesn't look the way you remember her. The bleeding caused her skin color to change and made her body swell. It also made her skin very fragile. You'll have to be careful if you touch her because in her condition, the skin ruptures easily. This is a horrible, horrible disease.”

  Dr. Julien explained that her disease, whatever it was, was probably highly contagious. Momma was isolated from other patients. Anyone who came in contact with her had to wear protective clothing and had to take an antibiotic pill.

  Al and I went in together. The protective gear made us look like we were ready to assist in surgery. A white shower cap covered my head. I pulled on the baggy white pants over my jeans and tied on a long white gown over my sweater. I covered my shoes with white footies and my hands with white plastic gloves. After swallowing the pill, I closed my eyes, took a long, deep breath and walked with Joyce and Al to Momma's room.

  Though she'd tried, Joyce could never have prepared me for what I saw when I walked into my mother's room. When I saw Momma, I was devastated. My knees buckled. Joyce and Al caught me as I collapsed into a heap of tears and sobs.

  The person lying in that hospital bed looked nothing like the beautiful smiling woman in the picture on my desk. The disease had ravaged her. She looked as if she'd gained 100 pounds. Her now-swollen head was the size of a big honeydew melon. Her lovely face was stretched out of proportion and the caramel-colored skin on her face, neck and hands had turned as black as licorice. Her nose was packed with white gauze. Her eyes were shut. She looked as if she was in a deep, deep sleep.

  Momma's lips were taped around the respirator tube. She was also attached to a jangle of intravenous tubes. They pumped in the nutrients, antibiotics and other drugs that staved off the final vestiges of death. Half the room was taken up by assorted machines monitoring her vital signs.

  Looking at her lying there, I ached all over. She was so helpless. I wondered if she was in pain. I wanted so badly to do something to comfort her but there was nothing to do now. She couldn't feel my kiss or hear me say I loved her. I couldn't even caress her because I was afraid I might tear her skin. It broke my heart. I was crying hysterically. Someone carried me out of the room.

  I couldn't imagine the agony my mother had endured from the time the paramedics wheeled her into the emergency room at 5:00 A.M. With the infection racing through her and her temperature soaring, the ER staff had wrapped her in a green plastic cooling blanket that looked like a sleeping bag. She was conscious and alert but the internal bleeding had already begun. Within an hour, her eyes had a vacant, glassy look. She was losing consciousness. They moved her to intensive care, but her condition rapidly worsened.

  Every doctor in the hospital came by the room to consult with Dr. Julien about a diagnosis and treatment. No one had ever encountered anything like it. The fever and flulike symptoms suggested meningitis, but others didn't match. Not until several days later did they discover the cause of death. Momma had contracted a deadly bacterial infection that led to a rare condition known as Waterhouse-Friderichsen syndrome.

  In ICU—hours before I would arrive—Momma's skin began to darken. Then, shortly before 8:00 A.M., one of the monitors blurted out a loud, long beep. The nurse in the room screamed “Code Blue!” Momma was dying.

  Joyce and a half-dozen others rushed to ICU, but it was too late. A technician wheeled in the electroencephalograph to check for brain activity. The only mark on Momma's EEG was an unwaveringly straight horizontal line, indicating total brain death. The doctors immediately put her on the respirator. But over the next twelve hours, her condition never improved. The EEG readings were always the same—a long, flat line.

  Back in the family room, Al and I finally managed to compose ourselves. But Debra and Angela continued to cry and cry. They couldn't stop. I really felt sorry for them. They were awfully young to have to deal with something like this.

  Actually, none of us was exactly grown up. Al had just turned twenty-one, I was eighteen and Angie and Debra were seventeen and sixteen, respectively. Despite the bad relations between him and my mother, my father was at the hospital with us. But Al and I felt responsible for our little sisters. And seeing how upset they were made us realize how important it was for us to be strong. As we hugged our sisters, my brother and I looked into each other's eyes for emotional support.

  The question now was: What to do? Joyce came over to the sofa where we were sitting and pulled up a chair. She said it was time to make a decision. Della was seated nearby and Rev. Owens stood next to her. He led us in a prayer for strength. Then he advised us to turn the respirator off.

  “Children, it's time to let your mother go,” the minister said. “Her spirit's already gone. What you see in there is just her body. Mary is already in heaven.”

  Angie and Debra just lost it. They were hysterical. Al and I held them. Tears were streaming down Della's cheeks.

  Through it all, Joyce remained stoic. “Mary's never suffered a day in her life,” she said. “By keeping her connected to the respirator all you're doing is prolonging her agony and yours. Being hooked up to machines is no way to live, and Mary wouldn't want it.”

  But who would make the decision? Who would tell the doctors to turn off the respirator and let what was left of my mother die? Given the deterioration of his relationship with her, Daddy had no say in the matter. Della bowed out, saying the decision was up to the children. Poor Al had his hands full consoling my sisters. He looked at me.

  I didn't know what to do. Even though she was only alive because of the machine, I told myself, at least some part of Momma is still with us. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized she wasn't really living anymore. That was the point Joyce was making.

  After a long, tense silence, I looked at Al, Debra and Angie. We all held hands. Tears started to well up in my eyes, my lips were quivering and my voice cracked.

  “This is the hardest thing in the world to say. But, I think we should take her off the machine,” I said. “I don't want to do it. But we have to do what's best for her. We'll never be able to talk to her again. We can't even touch her. Leaving her like this would be torture. If we disconnect it and it's meant for her to breathe on her own and live, she will. If not, she'll go to heaven and find peace.”

  Al agreed, “That's what she'd want.”

  Debbie and Angie nodded slowly. We embraced each other. One at a time, everyone went in to say good-bye to Momma. The process took a long time. Everyone had to put on white clothes again. People cried and consoled each other. More of my mother's colleagues and friends came into the family room and told us how sorry they were.

  Finally, it was my turn to bid my mother farewell. I dreaded this moment. Slowly, I walked in the room and approached her bed. I looked at her for a long time, gently stroking her arm. I still couldn't believe this was happening. The lump in my throat burned. The tears stung my eyes. I could barely talk. I bent over and whispered in her ear: “Momma, I'll never forget you. I love you and I'll miss you. Rest in peace.”

  We were all in the family room and most of the crowd was still scattered along the corridor when Joyce walked down the hall and into Momma's room to supervise the respirator shutdown. All of a sudden, a woman's anguishe
d voice echoed down the hall, piercing the silence. It was the head ICU nurse whose job it was to turn off the respirator. She ran out of my mother's room wailing, “I can't do it! I just can't do it to my friend! They're not going to make me do it, Mary!” When we heard her, all of us started crying.

  Joyce stepped over to the respirator. She glanced upward. “Lord, this isn't what I planned for this lady. This must be your plan.”

  Then she looked down at Momma. “Old friend, you know I love you. This is the last thing I get to do for you.”

  She flipped the switch to the off position. It was 10:00 P.M. After several minutes, the pulse monitor flatlined. The doctor pronounced Momma dead at 10:30.

  Della and Marcella led us out of the hospital an hour later, after we signed the pile of medical papers Joyce shoved in front of us. It was a clear, crisp frigid night. But everything looked foggy to me. I felt lost and helpless. Like an explorer who's lost her compass, I had nothing to steer by.

  My mother meant everything to me. She was my confidante, my teammate and my best friend. Whose words would pump me up when I was deflated? Whose shoulder would I cry on? And who on earth would listen so patiently while I yammered on and on about my athletic feats?

  Irrationally, I blamed my father for her death. If he hadn't been so mean to her and caused her so much pain and torment, she might have been strong enough to fight off the infection. And now that she was gone, I didn't know if I'd ever be able to forget what he'd put us all through.

  Immediately after Momma's funeral, an avalanche of problems, responsibilities and decisions fell on my family. The top priority was providing for Debra and Angie. Al wasn't sure he wanted to return to Arkansas State; and I was considering taking the semester off and getting a job.