Family Ties

“Casey, I don’t even realize I’m sick. This is all I know,” were my brother’s words when we spoke of his soon-to-be transitioning to Heaven.

Coby was tough.

He fought for his life every second of it, and he never complained.

At the age of twelve, my brother was given the choice of being evaluated and, hopefully, having a double-lung transplant. Death was his other option. There was nothing else they could do with him.

Transplantation was a new major surgery that was working for people with cystic fibrosis, an incurable disease.

My brother was against it at first, but a fellow CFer who had received new lungs told him it was worth it just to be able to breathe, no matter how much time she had left.

Coby was turned down by many hospitals in the States, due to his condition, but UNC Hospitals in Chapel Hill, North Carolina said to come on, and they would evaluate my brother.

A life changer it turned out to be.

My dad and brother flew out to Carolina to see if Coby would be accepted for the surgery, and my mom and I stayed back to take care of things in Texas.

This was the first time our family was ever split apart, but it would be worth it.

For reasons unbeknownst to my dad, he kept a daily journal of his thoughts about the entire experience. He wrote on yellow legal pads and then put them away for years. Twenty-nine years to be exact.

“We’ve got to get these published,” I told my dad, the Toddford, after I found the journals. “They will truly help others going through something like we did, or any issue for that matter.”

Dad read the entries to me, and I typed them up. We laughed and cried, taking breaks at times as the memories were hard to deal with.

But it was something awesome to relive our North Carolina trip, remembering all the people who came together to keep my brother alive, becoming Tar Heels (tried and true since ’92!), and being taken right back to a time that was very hard on our family but a blessing at the same time.

The Toddford and Coby were a great team. It all started with the two of them taking a plane to an unknown place and that very place becoming home in the end.

Return to North Carolina with Todd and Coby Gent as they both fought for new life in The Day Ain’t Over Yet: A CF Dad’s Journal by Todd Michael Gent, available on Amazon. Links also on our page.