Thank you for visiting Landscapes by Larue. If you would like to inquire about any of the paintings seen on this blog, please feel free to leave comments, or email LaRue personally at labrough@skyviewmail.comScroll down to admire all artwork and please check back! LaRue is adding more and more beautiful landscapes to her collection all the time!
My Story
Struck suddenly by Guillain-Barré syndrome only five days after having an intestinal virus that started Nov. 9, 2005, LaRue Brough experienced terrible pain in her hands and feet that felt like hot needles. Upon waking up one morning her fingers were numb and she could hardly walk. Her 81-year-old husband, Lee Brough, 17 years older than LaRue, was very concerned about her. Her daughter Elizabeth and son-in-law, Adam, took her to InstaCare, where Penny Emmett, NP-C, did a thorough examination, called Dr. Gregg Last, and put her in the hospital. LaRue was totally paralyzed from the neck down by then, including her colon and bladder, but she was able to breathe and swallow.After doing a thorough examination, Last believed LaRue’s illness to be Guillain-Barré, in which the autoimmune system attacks the myelin sheaths that cover the nerves somewhat like electric wire is covered. Guillain-Barré can follow an intestinal virus, respiratory virus or a flu shot, LaRue said. Neurologist Dr. Luciana DeSaibro did an MRI and spinal tap that positively diagnosed Guillain-Barré. After five days of treatment with immunoglobulin, LaRue no longer had the syndrome, but she did suffer the effects. She was in the hospital for two weeks, and then at Dixie Regional Medical Center Acute Rehab center for eight weeks. Her occupational therapist, Steve, was a pretty special man who worked really hard to try to get her walking before she left the hospital, she said. However, she was allowed to go home when she could sit up. The care she received from her husband, family, and friends at home has been phenomenal, LaRue said. Elizabeth and Adam moved in to take care of LaRue until Elizabeth had her baby on LaRue’s birthday, April 7. A neighbor, Zane Whiting, gave her a Jazzy (electric wheelchair) at Christmastime. Friends Jo Jeppson and Janice Hunter have come to her home three nights a week to help her with physical therapy from the time she came home. She loved to garden and being unable to do so, her husband hired someone to come and plant for her. Her friend Anna May Honsvick came and weeded the garden for her through the season. Many people have brought meals. She knows what other people who are paralyzed feel, but she knows that her abilities will come back, said LaRue. “It’s been a real experience to learn how to do everything again. I had to be taught even how to feed myself again and how to use my hands.” Spending her days on her couch in front of the window, she saw the winter turn to spring and watched the leaves come on the trees. She had to have help with everything. Her family had a slide bar to slide her from the couch into the Jazzy and back on the couch again. She’s had to learn to walk again, feed herself, and stand up straight. “It’s been a real challenge, but it’s taught me a lot,” said LaRue. “There’s been so many miracles, having that Jazzy come and having my friends come and help me with therapy.” Prior to Guillain-Barré, LaRue did a lot of handiwork. She tatted, crocheted, and embroidered. She was fast and loved to do handiwork and couldn’t imagine what she would do without the use of her hands. Now, unable to write and barely able to sign her name, and unable to do handiwork, she is amazed that she has learned to paint. Friend Anna May Moss gave her painting lessons when LaRue expressed a wish to learn. Everyone was amazed that she learned to paint so quickly, especially considering she had never painted before her illness. She has painted about 15 paintings since May and won a first place award in the Washington County Fair on two pictures.Unable to go many places anymore, she enjoys it when Anna May Moss takes her to her favorite place Michaels to buy painting supplies. Her hands and feet hurt all the time, but she doesn’t notice the pain when she is painting. However, she had another setback when she fell and broke her hip at home in July. Again, she ended up in the hospital and rehabilitation. “She’s had a touch of Job,” said Lee Brough.After losing her first husband, Jimmy Bristol, to leukemia in 1978, LaRue had her sixth child, Jeramy, five months later. LaRue met Lee Brough at the Terrace Ballroom in Salt Lake City in 1981, and they were married Oct. 7, 1981.Six months after their marri LaRue’s 9-year-old son, Christian, died from a brain tumor. He had five brain tumors removed in a two-year period at Primary Children’s Hospital. The sixth tumor took his life. Her husband took good care of Christian, she said.You really begin to see how valuable life is. All of this stuff that you have, you can’t take with you, LaRue said.Lee Brough has five children from his first marriage. He helped LaRue finish raising her five children, Lori Ade, DeeAnn (Rick) Adams, Mike (Shelley) Bristol, Lynn (Sheryl) Bristol, and Jeramy (Rheanna) Bristol. Together they had Elizabeth (Adam) Jowers. The two have 23 grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.The Broughs moved from Bluffdale, Utah, to Washington County just over 15 years ago, first in Washington, then to Toquerville about 12 years ago. LaRue says that her husband takes good care of her. He does the cooking, dishes, laundry, and various other things. Elizabeth cleans the house for them. “I would like to thank from the bottom of my heart all the doctors and the nurses and the therapists,” LaRue said.” I would especially like to thank my neighbors Scott and Nancy English and all the many others who have been so kind and generous. Most of all, I really love and appreciate my family and want them to know how much they mean to me.”
