Essen family man is in a coma after falling down the stairs

For a young family from Margarethenhöhe in Essen, life has changed from one second to the next: Torgen C. (46) fell down the stairs at home shortly before Easter and has been in a coma since then, as his wife Hanyie C. reports. Neighbors are now planning a benefit concert for May 27th and are raising funds for the family as concerns for the husband and father are now combined with existential angst.

It’s been around six weeks since Hanyie C. (38, the names are known to the editors) heard a noise in the apartment at night. She got up to find her husband, Torgen, lying on the floor, bleeding and unresponsive. Apparently he had fallen down the stairs from the upper floor. She immediately dialed the emergency number and at the same time tried to calm her two children (four and nine years old), who had since woken up, the mother reports.

The fate of the Essen family man moved neighbors and friends

“We were all so scared. My husband had lost consciousness. He had to be resuscitated and was then taken to the university hospital.” According to his wife, Torgen C. suffered a fractured skull base and a cardiac arrest, later pneumonia and had to stay in intensive care for four weeks. In the meantime he has been transferred to Krefeld for neurological rehabilitation, where she visits him several times a week. Because she has to be there for her children at the same time, it’s not easy, says Hanyie C.

“The journey takes an hour in total, but my husband is my life, I want to be with him and we hope that he will notice the visits,” she says, vacillating between hope and fear. “We had already said goodbye because things were so bad for him. It’s all so terrible. “Her husband opens his eyes in a coma and she hopes that you can reach him somehow. “We still had so much planned, we finally planned a holiday again,” she says sadly. Now she had to decide many difficult things on her own, for example that her husband should have a tracheotomy.

Nobody knows whether Torgen C. will be completely healthy again. “I won’t give up hope, but I won’t hope too much either, so that I’ll fall too low if things turn out differently,” says the 38-year-old, describing her difficult emotional state. “I have to protect myself and the children.”

The couple has been together for 13 years and married for six years. In 2019 the family moved back to Margarethenhöhe, where the husband and father grew up. Torgen C. trained as a banker, but then completed a special education degree and worked in the social sector for a while. But then he went back into business. By her own account, Hanyie C. had just completed her additional training after completing her studies and wanted to start anew professionally. Now everything is uncertain.

Financial worries add to her fears for her husband and father

In addition to the emotional burden, there is currently concern about the future of the family, since the father was the family’s main breadwinner and it is unclear how things will continue. Her husband is not only popular with family and friends because of his willingness to help, says Hanyie C. That is why they are now organizing the benefit concert and collecting donations for the family.

“Donations cannot ease the pain or turn back time. At the same time, it is the reality that this pain is quickly accompanied by existential worries,” says the appeal for donations. “We want to help give the family financial stability. A basis that makes it possible to avoid financial hardship and, in particular, to give the children their home in their familiar surroundings on Margarethenhöhe.”

The benefit concert is to take place on Saturday, May 27, at 5 p.m. in the Gustav-Adolf-Haus, Steile Straße 60a. Admission is free, donations for the family are welcome.

The program of the benefit concert on the Margarethenhöhe

The program of the concert: Dua Aedea Maria del Mar Humanes (soprano), Maxim Shamo (piano): Fernando Obradors: Al Amor (To Love), Enriqiue Granados: No lloreis ojuelos (Don’t cry, little eyes), Enrique Granados: Gracia mia (My graceful one); Petya Eneva (violin): Johann Sebastian Bach: Siciliana and Presto (from Sonata No. 1 for solo violin); Dora Mushkina (saxophone) / Evgeny Mushkin (piano): Bart Howard: Fly me to the moon; Dora Mushkina (saxophone) / Evgeny Mushkin (saxophone): Luiz Bonfá: Manhá de carnaval.

Marc Hewitt (trumpet) (jazz) / Maxim Shamo (piano): William Henry Tyers: Panama, Jelly Roll Morton: Buddy Bolden’s Blues, Mark Fisher, Joe Goodwin, Larry Shay: When You’re Smiling; Ana Ilievska (guitar): Johann Kaspar Mertz Elegy; Claudia Lindner (flute) Rainer Helling (piano): Johann Christoph Pepusch: Sonata in F Major, Francois Joseph Gossec: Tambourine.

Petya Eneva (Violonine): Fritz Kreisler: Recitativo and Scherzo-Caprice Op. 6; Evgeny Mushkin (oboe) / Maxim Shamo (piano): Jean-Baptiste Loielliet: Sonata in C major 1st movement, Ennio Morricone, Gabriel’s oboe; Christian Kircher (cello) Maxim Shamo (piano): Bernhard Romberg: Cello Sonata in E minor Op.38 No. 1; Dua Aedea Maria del Mar Humanes (soprano) Maxim Shamo (piano): Robert Schumann “Lotosblume”, Richard Strauss “Poppy”, Richard Strauss “Dedication”.

Donations for the family are also possible under

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