This site was established to tell of the miracles of God in the life of Clark Menshouse.  To help you with some perspective about what you will see and hear, we give you the following summary:

On May 7, 2005, Clark Menshouse, a 16 year-old from Ashland, Kentucky was involved in a terrible car accident.  There were two other teenage boys in the car.  Clark lost control of his car while negotiating a turn on KY Route 168 and the car struck a utility pole at exactly the driver's seat.  No drugs or alcohol were involved but the car was going too fast.  The force broke the pole in two.  Many firefighters, police and EMT's responded to the call and heroically ministered to his physical needs.  He was unconscious, bleeding heavily and had difficulty in breathing.  The emergency personnel established an airway almost immediately, which was crucial because it took over an hour to extract Clark from the vehicle.  He was flown by helicopter to Cabell Huntington Hospital.

In the emergency department that night we were given little hope.  The trauma surgeon told us that among several fractures of his left leg, right hand and pelvis that his most life-threatening injury was the trauma to his head.  She told us that the CT scan showed the "worst bleed" she had ever seen.  That meant that his chances of living were minimal and that, if he lived, we could expect severe damage to the brain from the swelling and additional bleeding that would take place over the first 72 hours.

But live he did!  He was unconscious for the first 10 days in the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU), where he was sustained on a ventilator and 8-10 IV pumps.  There was no movement and no response to neurological checks.  On the second day the decision was made to insert a device called a "bolt" into Clark's brain, to read the pressure in the brain and to try and relieve that pressure by draining spinal fluid.  We were told not to expect the bolt to last over a couple of days because it would clot up and stop draining.  But it kept draining until it was removed one week later.  After 7 days a CT scan showed that 90% of the bleeding in Clark's brain had been reabsorbed by his body!  During that time his cranial pressures remained normal!

During the time that the cranial bolt was in place, Clark could not be moved.  As mentioned, one of his additional injuries was a broken femur bone in his left leg.  The only alternative at the time was to place him in traction.  The next step was to be surgery to insert a pin into the leg.  But over the next two weeks Clark developed a daily fever.  The doctors worked hard to try and pinpoint the cause but to no avail.  Because of the possibility that the fever was coming from some source of infection, the surgery plans had to be changed.  The new plan became to place 6 pins into his femur and to connect those pins with rods externally.  It proved to be a painful and burdensome solution but it was the only safe option.

At the beginning of the second week in PICU, he began to open his eyes.  He was still not responding to commands or able to communicate.  Several days later came the breakthrough of a "thumbs up" response when one of the physical therapists entered his room.  It was repeated later with several doctors and nurses.  He was transferred to the Pediatric floor on May 25th.  Next came on of the most difficult and yet one of the best decisions that had to be made.  The hospital staff began asking us about long-term rehabilitation plans.  Several "in-patient" facilities were mentioned and a likely scenario laid out:  because of his inability to respond to commands and his expected three-month recovery from his femur fracture, the best course of action would be to place him in a nursing facility until he could be transferred to a rehab facility either in Lexington, KY or in the Carolinas.  We knew without a doubt what we should do, so we brought him home on May 28th, three weeks to the day from the accident.  We turned his bedroom into a hospital room and began to make plans to do his rehabilitation from home.  At this point he still could not speak, he could not eat - in fact he could not even turn himself in his bed.

At this point God brought an incredible rehabilitation team into our lives.  It started with physical, speech and occupational therapy at home, through Bellefonte Home Health, and continues today at their outpatient facilities.  Clark said his first words after the accident on July 3rd.  They were "happy birthday, Dad"!  He soon began to learn to chew and swallow food (first request - a  meximelt from Taco Bell).  He began to sit and then to stand and then to walk - first with a walker and then an cane and now on his own!  His speech, though still slightly slurred (we call him Yogi Bear) is improving daily.  He is resuming his schoolwork through Paul Blazer's homebound program and has every hope of graduating with his class in May of 2006!  Right now our plans may even include returning to campus in the spring for normal classes.

He is a walking miracle!  The direct result of a loving God who protected him, sustained him and who continues to heal him.  It is our prayer that Clark's story will draw you closer to that miracle-working God and that you will be encouraged by God's work in his life.  To God be the glory!