Clayton had been sick for a while. He had been to the doctors for sore throats and lung problems. He had not mentioned the big boil on his groin area to the doctors. I guess they did not do blood work on him, or if they did the infection did not show up. At Christmas, his family tried to get him to go back to the doctors, he would get to where he was like in a stupor. He refused to go.

About a week to 10 days before he died he was taken by ambulance to Memorial Mission Hospital in Asheville, NC. I talked to everyone by phone so do not remember all the time sequences. He was taken into surgery and they worked on his leg, they believed that he had gangrene. Shortly after that his kidneys shut down and then after that his blood pressure kept dropping. He was in toxic shock. He was on a respirator and they said he had double pneumonia. They were slowly draining his lungs and after a few days of his kidneys not working they put him on a kidney machine. They said that they waited to use the kidney machine because they were waiting to see if his kidneys would start working on their own. They didn't. They kept on changing antibiotics and giving him medicine to help his blood pressure stay up.

The doctors said that they did not have much hope for him to pull through. It was not until the day that he died that the doctors decided that he had Necrotizing Fasciitis. But it was too late. He put up one heck of a fight. To have lived as long as he did with it makes me wonder if it had been diagnosed earlier if he could have been saved.

Before he died his brother Rick asked if they could let him wake up so he could speak to him, but he was told that Clayton would be in too much pain if they did that. The whole family was there when he passed. This disease affected all of his organs, the place on his groin area where they operated was healing but his organs could not recover.

Clayton's family misses and loves him. We all pray that this terrible disease, that is so misunderstood, will become more understood and diagnosed correctly in the future. It is so important to be diagnosed early and for the public to be aware of this. Our hearts go out to those who have lost loved ones and pray that whoever has a medical problem will take it seriously and seek the best doctors that you can to heal you. I am sure that if Clayton had survived this that this is what he would have said.

God Rest His Soul!