TELL THEM I’MALIVE

Kim Nutbrown chronicles the remarkable recovery of a man who survived an accident so traumatic he has to go round town pointing out he’s a survivor.

‘‘THE guys have told me when they turned me around in the water my eyes were white and they knew I was dead,’’ Brendon Demmocks says.

‘‘They got me back to the boat and said they performed CPR. I woke, kind of vomited and abused them, and then passed out.’’

Demmocks and his workmates had been at an Australian resort, a former forestry area which had been purposely flooded by the Murray River.

He and two colleagues were being towed on a boat biscuit when the driver turned sharply and the biscuit hit a tree. The two other passengers jumped off in time, but Brendon’s head took the full impact of the collision with the tree.

At 11pm on Saturday, February 18 last year Kim Demmocks took a call from her son’s boss and the emotion in his voice told her straight away something was wrong.

‘‘He said they were on their way to the hospital. Brendon had been in an accident and it was serious. He was so upset he had to pass the phone to his wife.’’

Kim flew with her youngest son Ryan to the Melbourne hospital from her home in North Canterbury the next day, after getting an emergency passport – hers had expired.

‘‘We just didn’t know what to expect it was so hard to think about what state Brendon was in. He was all alone and we just wanted to get there.’’

The doctors told her she would have to make the decision of whether or not to turn off his life support.

‘‘They told me I had two hours to decide whether I turn off the machines or allow them to remove parts of his skull which would most likely leave him as a vegetable.

‘‘I knew he would never forgive me if I chose to keep him alive and he had no quality of life, but at the same time the thought of turning off the machines was unbearable.’’

Brendon’s other brother and sister joined Kim and Ryan at the hospital. All the family could do was wait and see.

‘‘We knew Brendon had suffered extensive injuries and we knew his brain had been damaged, we didn’t know what this would mean going forward. I just hoped I had made the right decision.

‘‘I kept staring at this tattoo on Brendon’s arm, it was still scabbed, so he had only recently had it done. I had never seen it before or even known about it.

‘‘It read ‘Time heals all, I will always find my way’ and I just thought that had better be a sign from you. You better promise me you’re coming back to me.’’

The day after Brendon had eventually woken from his coma, when Kim went to her son’s room on the ward where he had been transferred from ICU, his bed was made and he wasn’t there.

‘‘I panicked and went to the nurses’ station asking where he was, and then I heard ‘Hi Mum, what are you doing here?’ I turned around to see this smiling face and that is when I knew for the first time, I had him back.’’

In the days of heavy sleep following his coma, Brendon, a tractor mechanic, would drift in and out of consciousness, talking about repair jobs he had on the go.

He remembers parts of things that happened during that time.

‘‘Even when I was in the coma, I heard their voices. I knew my family were in the room, and I knew they were crying and I thought this must be bad,’’ Brendon says.

The damage: three brain bleeds, three neck fractures, three skull fractures, spine fracture, thoracic fracture and severe shoulder damage, a ruptured ear drum and blindness in one eye, the result of an infection caused by the dirty river water. He is on the waiting list for a cornea transplant.

Brendon’s improvements astounded both his family and his doctors.

‘‘No one could believe how well he was doing talking, walking and cognitive skills,’’ Kim says.

After six weeks Brendon was cleared to fly back to New Zealand and he went to Christchurch Hospital.

‘‘When we arrived back into Christchurch, the nurses tried to straw-feed him and offered pureed food only, I said to them he’s been walking around an airport eating takeaways,’’ Kim says.

‘‘It was just with the type of injuries Brendon had on paper, people were expecting him to be in a much worse state, his progress is remarkable to people.

‘‘Even now we go to appointments and the doctor will call ‘Brendon Demmocks’ and they get a surprise when Brendon stands up.’’

His family, friends and clients who have supported him are incredibly proud, but perhaps not surprised at his speedy recovery.

‘‘Brendon has always been that person who will persevere with something, he is patient and