‘I Must Be Strong’ : As Socorro Lopez Struggles to Take Care of Her Injured Son, She Prays for the Fortitude to Handle the Job Ahead

Over and over, Roberto Hernandez’s mother recalls the day her son left home:

He tosses a small canvas bag over his broad shoulders and heads down a dusty Mexican road to catch a bus. Destination: California.

Before he left, “I said to him, ‘God Bless you, mijo (my son),’ ” says Socorro Lopez. “He hugged me so tightly.”

Roberto eschewed a tearful farewell. “ ‘Mama, stay here at the door. Don’t go out into the street. I can’t bear to see you cry.’ ”

So Lopez stood behind the screen door of her two-room house as she wept and watched her 18-year-old son walk away, a $20 bill pressed between the bottom of his left foot and the leather of his sandal. The money was for Roberto’s journey from Purisima in central Mexico to a new life in a new land. Eventually, he found work and shelter in Corona.

That was almost two years ago--when Roberto was alive with curiosity, unafraid of the unknown.

He spoke often about returning to Mexico, getting married to a young woman from his hometown and raising a family of his own.

Lopez shared his dream. Until Jan. 2.

On that night, Roberto was a passenger in a car that was broadsided by a drunk driver, and the accident left him in a “vegetative state,” unable to speak, walk or feed himself. Summoned by another son, Estefan, who lived with Roberto, Socorro Lopez set out on the journey of her life.

It was the first time Lopez, 51, had ventured from Purisima, a town of 40,000. There was little money for travel, so she left her husband and five other children--ages 10 to 22--behind. As did Roberto, she put a $20 bill in her shoe and started the trip with little else.

Seven days later, she arrived in Corona. (A government visa assured her of a safe passage at the U.S.-Mexico border.) She knew no English. She had no friends. She had no understanding of what awaited her.

All that mattered was Roberto.

Somehow, in a matter of days, Lopez mastered the essentials: housing, transportation, hospital bureaucracy and survival English. She became a familiar fixture at Loma Linda University Medical Center, where her son had been hospitalized since March. She learned how to take care of Roberto all over again.

Only now she has no hope that he will grow up.

“I know his dreams are lost,” she says. “ El Norte steals our children and their dreams.”

*

On this particular summer afternoon, Lopez--a small, round woman with a braid of dark brown hair--is sitting next to Roberto at Loma Linda.

His physician, Murray Brandstater, says Roberto is in a coma-like state, “but he’s awake and unresponsive.”

Roberto’s torso, legs and feet are strapped in a wheelchair so he doesn’t fall and injure himself. His neck and head are held up by a brace. A tube is inserted into his stomach for the baby formula-like meals that are fed to him four times a day.

He can hear, but he cannot speak. He can sit, but he cannot walk. He can see, but to what extent he recognizes anyone, including his mother, no one knows. When he extends an arm, wiggles a finger or slightly moves his head, it is not in response to a request by a therapist or his mother. Doctors say the movement is involuntary.

This has been Roberto’s life since January. It will be this way forever.

Sometimes Lopez believes her son recognizes her. She talks to him constantly, touches him, squeezes his hands, places her palms on his cheeks. She reminds him that Purisima’s La Semana Santa (Holy Week) is coming up. She tells him that his favorite niece was recently baptized. And she shares a dream:

“I had a dream that you were in your wheelchair and stood up. I asked, ‘Where are you going?’ And you said, ‘I can walk, Mama.’ You went into the kitchen. ‘Are you hungry?’ I asked. And you said, ‘Pizza.’ You wanted pizza. I wanted to hold you up and you said, ‘No, Mama, I can walk by myself.’ ”

But Lopez sobs after she recalls her dream.

Roberto suffered extensive damage to the brain stem, which connects the brain to the spinal cord, says Brandstater, Loma Linda’s medical director of rehabilitation.

“Roberto’s case is much like a spinal cord injury at the base of the brain. The damage to the brain stem has affected all four limbs, swallowing, speech and eye movement.”

In addition, Roberto’s motor skills were severely damaged. “He has some, but limited, control over his muscles,” says Brandstater, adding that Roberto’s “lungs and heart are intact.”

After the accident, which occurred in Corona, Roberto was taken to Riverside General Hospital. He was later transferred to Loma Linda for rehabilitation. Brandstater began treating Roberto in early March.

Roberto’s care at Loma Linda, estimated at $140,000, has been covered by the Medi-Cal Recovery/Casualty Section of the Department of Health Services, according to Stephen Bellinger, a clinical social worker at Loma Linda.

After months of treatment, tests and therapy, Brandstater says he and his staff have concluded that Roberto “has some brain capacity” because he is able to move his arms and legs and maybe, at a later time, he could “reach out and grab things.” One day, he might possibly be able to feed himself with a tube, but he will never be able to swallow or eat solids, and “it is unlikely” that he will ever walk or “make any sound or speak.”

Roberto will be totally dependent on others for his care.

For the last several weeks, Lopez has been learning how to spot potential complications like pneumonia, flu, bronchitis or a bladder infection--conditions that would require hospitalization.

She has been spending nights by Roberto’s bed at Loma Linda, caring for him around the clock. During his sleep, she turns his 160-pound frame every two to three hours so he does not develop bedsores. An alarm clock awakens her for the nightly routine.

Every morning, Lopez stretches Roberto’s hands and arms, which stiffen during his sleep. She then places a mechanical sling under his body to hoist him out of bed and into a wheelchair and from the chair into a tub for bathing with a shower hose and nozzle.

Because Roberto doesn’t have control of his bladder and other bodily functions, Lopez also has learned how to remove, sterilize, and reinsert drainage devices, including a catheter.

She has learned from nutritionists how to mix the special formula that is his only source of food.

“We really sat down with her and went through every conceivable scenario as to what would be involved with his care, because caring for him is going to take more work than looking after an infant,” says Bellinger.

“An infant can feed himself. Not Roberto. An infant will cry when his diaper is wet. Not Roberto. An infant will move and wiggle, which means they will take care of their skin and not get bedsores. Not Roberto,” he says. “So the best thing we can do for Mrs. Lopez is to educate her.” Doctors say Roberto could live another 20 to 30 years--with proper care.

Vicky Chavez, who heads an organization that assists Spanish-speaking victims of violent crimes, says: “It is absolutely devastating for (Lopez). This is every mother’s nightmare, something no mother can ever imagine happening to her child.

“She sees him and prays that God will make him better. But his needs are so great, and he is going to need so much care.”

And money.

Even though a fund was started at Loma Linda to help with Roberto’s health costs upon his release from the medical center, hospital officials expect the money will last for only a year after his return to Purisima.

Lopez--whose husband makes less than $2 a day whenever he can find work cleaning yards and gardens and picking up trash--says she will manage. A 22-year-old daughter also works, and a married son has offered to help.

“I always have managed because I have faith in God,” she says. “I have hope. I believe in miracles.”

And she prays for the strength to handle the job ahead.

“I cannot faint. I cannot collapse. I have to be strong,” she says. “Put yourself in my place just for one minute and try to feel how I feel. You wouldn’t want to. It is going to be difficult. It is sad, very sad. I have to accept this.”

But Lopez then wonders aloud if her return to Mexico will be therapeutic for her. And perhaps, for Roberto.

“It will make me feel better to touch the earth there because we are from the earth. It will be like a new beginning for both of us. Mexico will bring Roberto back to life.

“He left Purisima for El Norte because he wanted to be successful,” she says. “He wanted his money to build a bedroom onto the house, and a bathroom with a shower stall. He never intended to stay in El Norte forever, just long enough to get his own room.”

That room was completed last month.

On the morning of Aug. 5, Roberto Hernandez was discharged from Loma Linda. Doctors said he had reached a point where his condition was stable, but they did not expect any more improvement.

With his mother and brother, Estefan, Roberto returned to Purisima with boxes of medical supplies, a wheelchair, an inflatable tub and other equipment. If Roberto needs urgent medical care, his mother or other family members will have to take him to Guanajuato, 70 miles from Purisima.

On the night of Aug. 5, Roberto slept in the room his money built.