Mom spends 136 days in hospital recovering from wrong-way crash

By Lauren Martinez

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    LAS VEGAS (KVVU) — A wife and mother of five from Henderson is back home after nearly losing her life in a wrong-way crash.

On Sept. 8 around 2 a.m., Deedra Russell left her Henderson home, driving a couple hours behind her son who had just packed up for college. They were on their way to Idaho, but decided to stay a night in St. George, Utah.

Russell never made it. She was hit head-on on I-15 in the Virgin River Gorge. She was life-flighted to St. George Regional Hospital.

“I woke up in the hospital, and I was on a ventilator I couldn’t speak. But the first thing I remember is Troy telling me I was in an accident, I’m going to be OK, but he kind of listed all the injures,” Russell said.

She had a shattered femur, broken bones throughout her legs, arm, extensive internal injuries and more, but her spine was OK and she didn’t have a traumatic brain injury.

“Probably the most damaging thing that happened is something impaled my abdomen and really damaged my intestines and my bowels,” Russell said.

But the 44-year-old has gone through far worse than this tragedy.

“It’s almost like the physical pain wasn’t as bad as the heartbreak I had suffered six years ago,” Russell said.

Russell’s son Austen was killed in 2015 after his father, Troy, accidentally ran over him outside their Henderson home.

“Anything compared to that, I definitely know I can handle it, so even all that pain I had in the hospital was really nothing compared to the pain of losing my son,” Russell said.

In total, Russell went through 18 surgeries. She laid in bed for two months unable to move.

“I had to learn how to do everything again I had to learn how to sit up, I had to learn how to get up from sitting to stand up, I had to learn to walk again,” Russell said.

Throughout her recovery she credits her faith, and the entire support system behind her family. She never felt alone with her husband, six sisters, and the community of friends and neighbors back home.

“I never had to be laying in the hospital bed feeling scared or stuck. Somebody was always there to help me so I had a lot of support and then I knew back home I didn’t have to worry about my kids because I knew my friends were taking care of everything,” Russell said.

Even something as simple as taking out the trash, people rallied around her family.

“We had dinner brought in I think every night I think I was in the hospital for 136 days someone brought in dinner. So actually the whole community came together and really helped my family out while I was gone,” Russell said.

Her husband Troy said for three straight months a group of mothers helped rotate with tasks taking kids to school, homework and laundry. Other volunteers were available to step in but every single one of them declined and continued to help.

“I want to cry sometimes when I think about it. People would pick our kids up from school or pick them up in the morning and people would come in the morning and do their hair. I tried doing one of our daughter’s hair one time and she cried saying I didn’t know how to do it I was doing the best I can so one of the mom’s started coming over and started doing it,” Troy Russell said.

On Jan. 22nd, Deedra Russell returned to her home in Henderson to hundreds of cheering neighbors lining her street.

She said she has nothing to worry about other than her recovery-which she still finds out new things every day.

“Like even today I was looking in the mirror cause I don’t really look in the mirror a lot but I noticed a scar here and I asked my sister was this like a cut or something she was like yeah- so I’m still noticing things,” Russell said.

Currently Russell has kidney failure. She can walk short distances with a walker but mainly uses a wheelchair.

“We’ll just take it day by day and we have each other and that’s what’s most important to me,” Troy Russell said.

Deedra Russell said the driver that hit her was impaired. Charges will be brought out in the coming weeks. A few weeks ago he wrote her an eight-page letter asking for forgiveness. Russell said she does forgive him.

“Even though it impacted my life greatly and it will impact the rest of my life he said in the letter that it changed his life too for the better. He’s changing his life around he’s trying to make better choices for himself and for his family and that makes me feel like at least it wasn’t somebody who just didn’t even care,” Russell said.

Donations for Deedra have been set up on this Gofundme page: gofundme.com/f/donations-for-deedra

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