This is Racheal Givens - Tom's wife. I want to thank everyone for your kinds words posted here and yes it was I that was reading over old post as a couple of you mentioned it's what family member's do when they are trying to grasp and hang onto any part of their loved ones past. I saw several of you asking questions concerning his life. Sadly Tom and I were only married 10 months and my heart is still breaking. He was my prince charming. As was mentioned at the funeral by his fellow Kiwanis members "Tom always refered to the boys as his sons - never his step children" what you saw with Tom is Tom. He was also a Christian man very active in church and he volunteered every Wednesday to read to our son's kindergarten class - so these poor childen had to counciled on the death of a loved one along with his son. He was a great man of character and yes he was very passionate about different things..he as we all do could say things (post things) that maybe we should have worded different doesn't make him or any of us a bad person.
I share this next part because I want everyone to know the warnings of a sudden heart attack..(and clear up some questions) Tom's arms were feeling like they were being squeezed just from his elbows down. He went to the doctor on Monday - the doctor was busy he saw the Nurse Practitioner - she said said it sounded like flu like simptions and said they would run blood work - I tried getting him to go to the er or walk in clinic but he said he would go back for his blood work and it was too much trouble to see a new doctor. He went back for the blood work on Wednesday and she said he diabetes - he was very concerning and called Vanderbuilt to set up a class time to learn more about this and even went that day and bought a book about reversing it. On Friday was our son's first soccer practice - oh how Tom had been looking forward to seeing him. I met them there after work and Tom said he felt bad and left after 10 minutes - he wouldn't let us leave because he felt it was too important to Ayden. When I got home he was laying in bed and read on line that it might be his heart - I said ok let's go NOW.. he stopped on the way out the door checking our Ayden's soccer bag to make sure he had all his stuff - I had to push him out the door - he then stopped on the side walk and hugged the cat. On the way to the hospital he mentioned if anything happened where he would want his ashes spread - we had never spoke of this. We walked in the er they took him straight back - said he was having a heart attack right then - they took him in to put two stints in the right side of his heart - four hours later the doctor said the surgery went great but they saw a shawdow behind his heart which meant blood - they wheeled him out and he was talking and actually in a good mood. When I got there hours later they said he needed another heart surgery but they had to wait for his blood to unclot before proceeding..I spent the night next to his bed - at 7am they did his 2nd heart surgery - afterwards all his organs started shuting down - at 11:30pm they took him back for his final heart surgery and at 12:07 my heart was broken forever as I lost the love of my life.
