By Chad Klassen

EXCLUSIVE: Mother of Jessie Simpson speaks about her son’s recovery for the first time

Nov 16, 2018 | 4:23 PM

KAMLOOPS — Every day, Susan Simpson is so grateful to still be able to hug and kiss her 21-year-old son Jessie. She embraces him every opportunity she can.

“It’s absolutely a miracle that he’s here with us today after what’s happened to him,” said Susan. “To be able to come see him every day is absolutely amazing, just how far he has come.”

Susan says Jessie has nearly died on multiple occassions during their tragic two and a half year journey. But she notes her little boy is a fighter. He was in a coma for 10 months and awoke from that, spent nearly two years at Royal Inland Hospital before coming to the care facility in April. 

The uncertainty over Jessie’s condition has been the most unsettling part of the journey. 

“I think every day, not knowing whether he’d be here with us or not, not knowing from one day to the next seeing him so sick, seeing so many awful things through the last two and a half years,” noted Susan. 

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In June 2016, Jessie, just 18 years old, was brutally beaten in a Brocklehurst neighbourhood following a graduation party. It left him with a severe brain injury. His attacker, Kristopher Teichrieb was sentenced last month to seven years in prison, minus time served, amounting to another three and a half years of jail time. 

Health care professionals working with Jessie have seen tremendous steps in his progress since moving to the care facility seven months ago. However, they say he’ll never return to his former self, a young, vibrant boy who loved life.

“Every day, you wake up and think ‘this happened to my son. How could this happen?’ You have to deal with it, you have to be strong for your child, and every day it’s just like ‘why me? Why did this happen to us?’” said Susan. 

RAW INTERVIEW: Watch full sit-down with Susan Simpson

Jessie is a shadow of his old self, but he’s working every day on improving, reading during rehab sessions that are re-teaching him the basics of life. It’s sometimes a struggle to get the words out, but eventually he masters them.

“It’s kind of like when he was little, things coming back slowly, a little bit at a time. It’s also hard seeing what he’s lost. 

Susan has accepted her Jessie will never be Jessie again. But she doesn’t lose sight of the fact she still has her son to cherish. It is Jessie that helped his mom move forward.  

“I think the strength of Jessie kept me going through, it has. I don’t think, I know my son is the strongest, most amazing person. He shouldn’t be here with us right now.” 

As Jessie sings ‘You Are My Sunshine’ to his mother in his bed, you can tell how much Jessie loves his mom and what she has done for him and what she’ll be doing for him the rest of his life. 

To help the Simpson family, you can go to their GoFundMe page here. The goal is $50,000 and some of the money will go towards a new wheelchair special wheelchair-accessible van for Jessie to get him out of the care facility, where he stays 24 hours a day, seven days a week.