Brandon Mehring, now 28, recently celebrated his fifth anniversary of working for the hospital system that saved his life.
Brandon Mehring, of Orland Hills, stands with his mother, Jo Ann O’Toole, of New Lenox. The 28-year-old survived a devastating diagnosis as a teenager, and now is able to work with Christ hospital and other Advocate sites"because they saved my life when I was 17," he said.
The life-altering moment came after Mehring noticed red dots all over his hands and wrist while scanning something at his cashier’s station at Menards in Oak Lawn. He had graduated from high school and was working there to fill time.“It was like someone poked me with a red pen,” he said. “I quickly realized they were all over my body. I felt no symptoms, just dots over all my body. … They weren’t itchy so I thought I should check into them.
Unbelievably, he heard the doctor say, “I recommend taking your son home and making him as comfortable as possible.” Apparently, it had been determined there was nothing they could do for the teen.“I collected myself and said everything was going to be fine,” O’Toole recalled. “We had to believe in a higher power and we had to think everything would be OK and there’s an answer to everything.”An ambulance took him to Advocate Children’s Hospital in Oak Lawn.
“When we arrived there were two nurses there. I never got their names, but there was an aura — a glow around the two of them — and I just felt like everything was going to be OK even though I was losing perspective over everything,” she said.“For the first time I actually got some information on what was going on with me,” Mehring said. “According to this pediatric oncologist, I had a rare blood disorder titled ITP,” which stands for immune thrombocytopenia.
“The clinical component of health care is not the only one that matters. There needs to be focus on the clinical components and mental components — I thought Christ did a great job keeping the physical and mental focus a priority.”Another critical factor in his recovery was support from his two best friends, Angelo Buscemi and Mike Lannoni.
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