[BobbyB]

Christmas joy: Service brings families together
Heather Civil • heather.civil@clarionledger.com • December 26, 2007


Vivian Clay (sitting, center) is surrounded by family members Jean Hart and Hart's daughter, Kearndra, joking with Clay about her Bluetooth device. Clay was taken home for Christmas from the Cottage Grove nursing home in Jackson by American Medical Response EMT Tonya Stevenson (left) and EMT-paramedic Carrie Aycock (right).


With the assistance of American Medical Response EMT Tonya Stevenson (right) and EMT-paramedic Carrie Aycock, Vivian Clay, a resident of Cottage Grove in Jackson, heads home to celebrate Christmas with her sister and her family.


Vivian Clay's family cried tears of joy when she arrived home on Christmas Day.


Clay was diagnosed in late 2006 with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or Lou Gehrig's disease. She has lived the past several months at the Cottage Grove nursing home in north Jackson.

Paramedics with American Medical Response took her to her sister's home for the holiday.

Clay, dressed for Christmas in a bright, red sweater, sweat pants and a red knit cap, had to be delivered to her sister's house on a gurney.

"We were wondering how we were going to get her here," Clay's sister, Joan Hart, 60, said.

AMR donated five ambulance trips for area nursing home residents, including Clay, who otherwise would not have been able to make the journey to see family. The ambulance service took three patients home in Jackson, drove one to Madison and another to Clinton.

AMR has donated ambulance service on Christmas Day every year since 1991.

"It's a really heartwarming project for everyone involved," AMR spokesman Jim Pollard said.

Lou Gehrig's disease has taken its toll on Clay. The fatal illness affects nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord and eventually causes total paralysis. Clay no longer can speak clearly or move most of her body.

But she still has a huge smile.

The 62-year-old got to spend all day at her sister's house with her family. An ambulance came later in the day to take her back to the nursing home.

"When she was smiling, that's what makes the trip good," paramedic Tonya Stevenson said as she finished getting Clay settled into a chair at Clay's sister's house.

A teacher at Pecan Park Elementary School, Hart visits her sister at the nursing home almost every day on the way to work.

Hart and Clay are close and have spent many Christmases together enjoying each other's company.

"We've never been separated during the Christmas holidays except when she was in California," Hart said.

Clay worked as a librarian at the Fannie Lou Hamer library branch in Jackson before she got sick.

She smiled broadly when she heard her sister talking about her and teasing her about the Bluetooth phone headset she wears on her right ear even though she can't really use the phone.

Clay's 22-year-old niece, Kearndra Hart, cried as she recalled past Christmases when her aunt could still tell her stories from her youth.

She cried, not because of sadness, but because she still can have her aunt with her at the holidays.

When she heard her niece crying, Clay began to cry, too.

"They're tears of joy," Hart said.


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