posted December 19, 2008
Three Saturdays ago, after enjoying a terrific Thanksgiving visiting relatives near and far, our family was surprisingly plunged into a crisis. My wife had been experiencing certain symptoms that caused me to transport her to Hutcheson Medical Center's ER after a discussion with my mother, a public health nurse with the State of Tennessee. Mom said go, so we did.
Thanks to the perfect actions of Hutcheson Medical Center and the rapid response of Blood Assurance, six pints of blood saved my wife's life. For the medically inclined, she entered the hospital with an HGB of two, still talking and relatively alert. By all accounts, she shouldn't still be with us. Prayers were answered that day, and I cannot thank Hutcheson Medical Center enough.
Then came the diagnosis. Another young mother, four children in tow, diagnosed with cervical cancer and given a 75% chance of survival. These are terrific odds for our frightened family, and the journey is a long, arduous process of radiation and chemotherapy which has already begun. We aren't thinking about the 25%; we are pleased she has been spared and that we've all been given a second chance.
My wife is in the outstanding care of Erlanger, and among the talents of Blood Assurance, Erlanger, Parkridge and Hutcheson her life has been saved and hopefully extended for many, many years. We don't know the outcome, but we have every intention of keeping her around long enough to see her youngest, a 12 year old daughter, get married someday.
These are the concerns of a family suddenly thrust into the vortex of perplexing illness. Will my wife be allowed the opportunity to see her daughter's wedding someday? Will I become a single parent of four? Will we make it through this financially? Will the children retreat into themselves out of pain and uncertainty? Can we just keep it together over Christmas?
Our family is strong, and we're going to be fine. We have been given many blessings, and this is a time for thanks – considering the circumstances.
We were granted a miracle with her life saved in an emergency room, and are certainly in the belief that the tough course of treatment will bring good news to replace the sad.
But this is not just about our family. There are many Chattanooga families in similar and much more dire situations than ours, and I see this experience as a fact of life we must traverse. We have no choice, so we might as well fight as hard as we can to win. We learn so many things in our lives that don't matter, and we must use this as an opportunity to teach our children to respect and nurture the things that do.
Through the prism of this premise, I wish to address the circus act brought forth by Keele Camille Maynor.
It would be easy to feel some sympathy for Ms. Maynor, the city employee who perpetrated a five year cancer hoax, out of general pity for her obviously sorry psychological state. However, the methods she employed to dupe other city employees are unconscionable and worthy of extremely harsh rebuke.
Ms. Maynor is fortunate to be employed by a family, in this case the collective faculty of the city of Chattanooga, willing to give of themselves to help a coworker in distress. Ms. Maynor not only abused her own generous time off (roughly six work weeks annually – 31 days), but savagely fleeced her work family of an additional 1,554 work hours donated to her suspicious cause. That's an additional 40 work weeks of time, cresting the liberal 31 annual days she'd already been granted.
What were you doing during this time, Ms. Maynor? Shopping? Knitting? Price Is Right?
In our situation, I have been dramatically humbled by the response of my employer. Like Ms. Maynor, I work for a company which has a fairly liberal policy with regard to time off. Sometimes I'll take a personal day without an exceptional reason, but not often.
When I approached my employer with the information involving my wife, I was instructed to take care of my family first and utilize whatever time I needed to assure their needs are met. I try to be at work every day, and to be honest these first few weeks it's been very hard to do so. I'm determined to work every possible day, to the best of my ability, to just keep going. My wife's employer has also been just outstanding, and anyone who has started down such a path knows what a gift that is.
An understanding employer, like the radio stations which employ me or the city of Chattanooga in the case of Ms. Maynor, should be appreciated and not abused. However, in Maynor's scenario, she opted to accept the charitable altruism of her fellow workers and plunder 40 weeks of their time to which she was not entitled.
Maynor says the situation "snowballed." Really? More like a snow job, of the highest order. From exactly which tall hill in your mind did that snow pack originate, Ms. Maynor? Have you no concept that the time you stole wasn't yours, but your coworkers', with the citizens of the city of Chattanooga footing the bill for your double-dealing dupery?
One might be inclined to inquire as to Ms. Maynor's inadequate level of shame, and the story indicates she hauled herself off to Valley for the all-too-common trip to therapy which tends to accompany the exodus from such tomfoolery.
Ms. Maynor said she's "glad the ruse is over" because she "doesn't have to keep up the charade anymore." Here's a secret, Ms. Maynor: For some people, it's not a charade. It's very real. It's real in ways you can't imagine, like trying to coordinate all the medical appointments or the fact I don't know how to do my daughter's hair. You have co-opted the reality of those who truly fight this life invasion, and even I can't articulate it with authority because our journey has only recently started.
I'm thrilled she can package up her five years of mendacity and fraud in such a cleanly wrapped box. No harm, no foul; I pulled the wool over the city's collective eyes for a half decade, but a resignation and some tactical therapy ought to do the trick.
This is disgusting, and every penny of value in those 1,554 hours of contributed coworker time should be calculated at the wage of the donor and assessed against Ms. Maynor by an ill-tempered prosecutor. Some crafty defense attorney would, no doubt, wrap the case in a psychological context and allow Ms. Maynor to escape the charges under a cloud of claims that her cerebral state is "not well."
She pretended to not be well, because she's not well, so that's swell.
Most criminals are not "well," and if any of the documentation in this story is accurate Ms. Maynor should be prosecuted with numerous books thrown in her direction at high velocity.
Keele Camille Maynor should not be allowed to walk away from city employment dragging 40 weeks of paid leave, graciously tendered by coworkers, in her wake.
I can always appreciate the claim of potential mental illness when someone does something that's off the charts bizarre. Mental illness is just as real, just as debilitating and just as deserving of support and empathy as any other type of legitimate ailment. Due to its vague and sensitive nature, mental illness also serves as an extraordinarily convenient escape hatch. Such would be necessary to release Ms. Maynor's hand from the cookie jar where it has taken residence.
Considering Ms. Maynor's breast cancer diagnosis and cure two years prior to the onset of her time spree, there's little evidence that any of this rings as genuinely attributable to any illness of any kind. Conversely, on first read it sounds like a cooked up scam that ramped up too much inertia to stop it, as is the half life of most cooked up scams. Ask Bernie Madoff, and he'll tell you.
My family, I suppose, is in as good a condition as possible to weather what is ahead of us. It's unpleasant, poorly timed, costly and maddening. There are physical, emotional and financial aspects of this we aren't sure how we're going to surmount. However, with strong families at home and at work, we will figure it out. The blessings we are counting haven't yet stopped, and for this we are most appreciative.
What I cannot appreciate, however, is the wild ride allegedly taken by Keele Maynor at the expenditure of your tax dollars via forfeiture of the earned time off of peers.
This time off should be returned to the city employees who willingly donated it, and Ms. Maynor asked to bear scrutiny of another selection of peers in a wood-paneled room with pews and a judge.
And for everyone, including Ms. Maynor, a very Merry Christmas. I'm sitting next to the most beautiful tree our family has ever decorated, counting my many, many faults while thankful for the life of someone who agreed for some reason to tolerate them.
And to the medical professionals who serve the Chattanooga area every day, may you receive a blessing in your lives for the amazing level of care each of us enjoys as a citizen of this region. I cannot imagine my family receiving greater compassion or more exacting competency anywhere else in America.
Jason M. Kibby
Ringgold
ringgold@gmail.com
* * *
Let me get this straight, the city of Chattanooga hires people convicted of government fraud ( the defendant's 2000 charge of food stamp fraud) to work for the government? Fraud criminals in positions of trust? Am I the only one shocked?
In addition, don't you need doctors letters and notes of verifications to authenticate time off for an extended period of time and such to keep getting any sort of benefits? I know I would have in every job I have ever had. That is quite shoddy business practice. Plus this lady had a blog on the cancer network? Unbelievable. How do you do that? I would be afraid of the Karma alone from even telling that lie in jest, much less for profit.
Veronica Madaris
sablestarr714@yahoo.com
* * *
Money and sick days do not even describe the emotional abuse that Keele inflicted on others: teachers (I am one), cancer survivors and those that died. And lets not forget the ultimate betrayal and abuse she caused her children and other family members.
Recently, Keele went to the beach compliments of several unsuspecting individuals that she has been scamming for years (this was to be her last fall break with her children). I cannot tell you how many times over the years that I have heard that one. There are many other examples of where Keele did not ask for a penny because she relied on the generosity of her friends that pulled at their heartstrings; they thought they were helping her precious children.
The real victims of this horror, are my friends and many others who shared their life and death stories with Keele. Other friends have walked in the Komen race for Keele. It is with little consolation that money was raised for the race in her name.
It will take me years to get over this situation emotionally. I cannot possibly imagine if her children will ever come to terms of having to live with this deception.
Kimberly Hays
Signal Mountain
| Dining Out | Business | Movies | Focus | About Us |
| Church | Living Well | Memories | Outdoors | Real Estate | Student Scene | Travel |
