A family favourite is firmly off the menu for this shell-shocked Aussie dad, writes Letitia Rowlands.
It was a delicious dish that Margot Green had cooked for her family countless times. But eating his grandmother’s chicken nasi goreng almost killed Shane Barnbrook when a small bone he swallowed perforated his bowel, causing a catastrophic infection.
Shane, 34, was left in a coma and paralysed from the neck down. While hospitalised for more than a year he also missed the birth of his daughter Aurora, and any contact with his other children Seth, 5, and Katie, 3, for two and a half months.
More than a year later, Shane has some movement in his arms but can only move his legs with assistance and has to be turned every two hours when lying down. “The doctors didn’t think he would survive and told us to say goodbye,” Shane’s wife Sarah says of the night her husband came close to death.
“He was on life-support and his skin was grey. We believed he was dying so organised for a priest to come and deliver his last rites.”
Thankfully Shane held on to life that horrific night, but only just. Sarah, 33, was almost nine months pregnant when paramedics rushed her husband to hospital from their home in Seymour, Victoria, in February 2012.
“I knew I had swallowed and passed the bone, but I didn’t realise the damage it had done was so serious until the pain became unbearable and my body went into shock,” says Shane.
Shane’s last words to his wife before going into surgery in Melbourne were “Don’t have the baby.”
But the former children’s disability services worker developed profound sepsis and was on life-support when his baby arrived nine days later.
“It was a bittersweet day,” says Sarah of Aurora’s birth.
“I was excited to meet our baby, but I also knew my husband was undergoing surgery that could kill him.”
Now, 15 months later, Shane is still in rehabilitation but is slowly improving. He hopes to move home in the next few months, however the family faces a $61,000 bill to modify their house and buy the required medical equipment.
Sarah has launched an online campaign, “Bring Daddy Home” (pleasebringdaddyhome.com), in the hope of raising the money.
“I just want to be at home and enjoy life with my family,” says Shane.
“This whole experience has taught me you should never take those simple things for granted.”
As for that nasi goreng, the Barnbrooks don’t blame 77-year-old Margot, but she’s definitely retired the recipe.
“Shane’s new favourite is my breakfast pudding and I take that to him as often as I can,” she says.
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