A Phone Call That Changed Everything

"In fact," Dr. Cantway told Dennis, "Matt's wounds are so severe that he had to be transported 40 miles south of Laramie to a hospital in Ft. Collins, Colo., that was better equipped to deal with head injuries."

As short as the call was—not more than five minutes—it was long enough, not only to turn our world upside down, but to send it spinning forever in the opposite direction. As I remember it, neither Dennis nor I had much to say to the doctor—or to each other. But we were dizzy with questions: Who? Where? Why? What? And most important, how was Matt? But Dr. Cantway couldn't answer anything we asked—other than to say that things didn't look good and that the only piece of information the police had found so far was Matt's University of Wyoming ID card. Thankfully, that card led them to his emergency contact, Matt's godmother, who worked as a nurse at Ivinson and had our contact information. The hospital called us immediately after getting our Saudi Arabian telephone number.

The rest of that morning was a blur. I do remember thinking,"If I come apart now, I'm never going to make it." Dennis and I were in shock and sort of went into autopilot, knowing there were things we needed to accomplish before we could give in to our fears.

As with all parents, our first instinct was to run to our son's side. Unfortunately, we happened to be 8,000 miles away. The flight to Denver, by way of Amsterdam and Minneapolis, didn't leave for 19 hours. To add to the already surreal situation, we still had to deal with the bureaucracy of Saudi Arabia and get the proper documentation to leave. Dennis and I were forced to wait almost an entire day before we could even begin our trip to be with Matt. We used that time to call a few relatives in the States to let them know what was happening and to make sure Matt wouldn't be alone in Ft. Collins. None of us knew what we'd find or would have to do once we reached Colorado.

As Dennis and I rushed around in a daze—packing our bags and preparing paperwork rather than staring at the slow-moving clock—I did everything I could to stay hopeful. Dennis and I had only limited information about the extent of Matt's injuries, and absolutely no information about the circumstances surrounding his attack. We knew he was critically injured and that his hold on life was tenuous, at best. Still, our highest hope at that point was for Matt's complete recovery. Our most basic, and perhaps most realistic, hope was that he would hold on to life until we could be with him, by his side.

During the 19 hours that Dennis and I waited in Dhahran, we were in constant contact with Ivinson hospital and then Poudre Valley Hospital. But in all that time, there was very little they could tell us about what had happened to Matt. Although the medical staff knew he had been attacked—his injuries were too severe to suggest anything else—nobody could explain who had done this to my son or why. When it came down to it, I knew that no amount of speculation on my part would help answer any of the thousands of questions that were already overwhelming me. Even if I could find answers, I knew that none would ease the panic or the excruciating pain welling up at the root of my soul. No answer could help Matt, who was hanging on to life with every ounce of his incredible strength. So as our plane finally took off, for the first leg of our long flight, I gripped Dennis's hand and tried to force myself to think of better times.

Shepard is the Executive Director of the Matthew Shepard Foundation. This selection is excerpted from her new memoir, The Meaning of Matthew: My Son's Murder in Laramie and a World Transformed, which comes out today from Hudson Street Press.

© 2009