Thursday, January 18, 2018

An Unfathomable Tragedy


I can't believe I have to write this but here it goes....

So, E has been going to Jeff to get his hair cut since he was two and a half years old. It took awhile to find someone too. I'd gone to all the "kids" hair places in the immediate area. All of them. Rita's, Charles, David Alan Kids. I had someone at Rita's for awhile, but then he went missing. Literally, missing, to the point where I wrote a blog looking for Ricky, but to no avail. Then I was like, why am I paying twenty-five dollars for a child's haircut. That's the going rate at all these kid places and it's a racket.

B, E and I would go to eat dinner in Garden State Plaza and Plaza Salon was right there in the mall. It was easy to either eat dinner and then get a haircut for him or vice versa. None of these kid places are open at seven or eight o'clock on a Saturday evening.

After going through a few hairdressers, we found Jeff. With E doing acting, he has to have his hair relatively the same all the time. He has to look like his head shot photos. Jeff totally gets that and cuts his hair perfectly every time. Plaza Salon left the mall, but it's still on Route 4, just on the other side, so it's still extremely convenient with they're late hours during the weekend til nine and Saturday until eight.

Jeff always takes E on the fly, gives him a great, quick cut, we chat about life, and we're on our way. Even B started going to him. It's been like six years now. We've known Jeff before he was engaged, before marriage, before kids. We knew how happy he was before and during all these milestones.

We've never met Danielle, but we'd hear about her all the time. I remember him telling us they she was pregnant. Then when she was pregnant AND uncomfortable, and I told him to go get her a Snoogle pillow from Buy Buy Baby after work and surprise her with it.

He is always interested in what E's doing on TV and what auditions he's gone on. He's just a really nice guy. I don't want to get him in trouble, but he never even raised the haircut cost on us even though he knew E would've aged up to the next price. I know it was hard for him to tell us he had to charge us a dollar more because that's what the minimum is now. He could've just said on E's birthday last year- "hey, happy birthday, now you owe more for your hair". But he didn't. And we really appreciated it.

We knew Danielle was having the new baby (we didn't know a name, just that it's a girl, Gia Rose!) between Christmas and New Years. B had gone to get a haircut and said that if E needs one, Jeff's out after X date. I timed it so he wouldn't need one until Jeff would definitely be back.

We went there last night and when we pulled in, B said that he didn't see Jeff. Jeff's chair is by the window so we always look to see if he's there. We went in, heard what happened, and were shocked. I immediately Googled them to see if there was anything online (my first go-to). Jeff is kind of private and hates social media, even though I've tried to get him to promote himself on Facebook for years! So I knew I couldn't find anything on Facebook (except now would be a good time to go on Jeff...). I saw the article in the Daily Voice and knew I'd be writing this today. I texted Jeff to ask if it was okay, told him it would be shared on Facebook and Twitter, and he still gave me the go ahead.

Long story short- Ten days after having her baby girl, Danielle had a thunderclap headache and bleeding on the brain. She went into a medically induced coma. Last night I believe we were told she's out of the coma, but I'm not 100% sure on that. Regardless, she's going to need a lot of therapies and who knows what else. She's a teacher, and obviously can't teach. Jeff is a barber who doesn't get paid if he doesn't work. He can't work while his wife is fighting for her life and he's taking care of a two year old and a newborn. I'm sure he has some help from friends and family but there are still going to be tons of medical bills and things they'll need that insurance just doesn't cover.

Someone set up a Go Fund Me account so I'm sharing it. Any amount can help ease some of the financial stress that this is putting on this young family. Jeff is the nicest guy, and I can only imagine how hard this is for him and the kids, not to mention Danielle who has a long road ahead of her medically.

https://www.gofundme.com/help-bring-danielle-home

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