KANSAS CITY, KS — N’Deia Porter is on a long road to recovery with her mother Brandi Casey by her side, trying to figure out what's best for her daughter.
“I feel kinda like a failure, because I was just like, you know, I’m doing all of this, I’ve actually got you home and now you're going right back,” Casey said.
For Casey, this nightmare continues as she helps her daughter continue to recover from over eight gun shot wounds that left her paralyzed from the neck down.
“She is getting better," Casey said. "She's making progress with her trach. She's making progress on her ventilator."
Casey says she is feeling thankful and blessed her daughter is recovering, but this process is far from over. Porter is now back in the hospital after coming home just a week ago.
“She did okay, the first night, the second night, she had a fever," Casey said. "It started off at like 102 and went up to 104 and we could not break it for anything. And the next morning, we took her back to the hospital and she had pneumonia and another infection."
However, while Casey was happy to see her daughter come home, it was a challenge simply getting her into the house and up the stairs.
“So the night when she came home, they got her released super late from the hospital [and] it was dark, she was scared," Casey said. "She was crying [and] they ended up not having the ambulance being able to bring her home. They had another company to do it.”
Casey continued to describe the struggles of that night.
“They struggled because there wasn’t a wheelchair ramp, and they pushed her up the yard and they really struggled," she said.
Casey said this was an ordeal that was hard to watch.
“They had to take her off of the stretcher and have my kids and whoever was here that day to carry her in a sheet to her hospital bed," She said. "And so she started you know, having a little slight bleeding and she started moving and she was sacred it was just not ideal."
Casey said she knew Porter's return home would be far from easy.
“We don’t have the means for her to go to rehab out of state," Casey said. "We also don’t have the handicap accessible van that we are needing, to get her to and from appointments. As well the ramp we need to get her in and out of the home."
Now, Casey hopes a rehab facility will take Porter sooner rather than later, to get her daughter the care she not only needs but deserves.
“Theres a rehab in Denver that might accept her but we are looking at transportation costs to get here there," Casey said. "Also, to stay there you know just coming back and forth to home just to check on the house."
As Porter works to recover, Casey finds hope knowing the suspect is now behind bars facing charges, according to police.
“Any victim of violent crime, our hearts go out to," Nancy Chartrand, public information officer said with KCKPD said. "But, when you have somebody like India, I mean, it's really hard to try even in law enforcement to wrap your brain around. How does this happen?"
However, Casey wants more than justice, she simply wants her daughter to get the life back she rightfully deserves.
“My Christmas miracle is that I can get moved and get everything that India needs all together, and she can just be at home with family and won't have to you know go back to the hospital,” she said.
