Thread: Man beats odds and becomes a citizen

great honor'
AILING MAN WAS IN HOSPICE CARE | But he beats odds, becomes citizen

September 15, 2007
BY DAVE NEWBART Staff Reporter/dnewbart@suntimes.com
The last time Svend Clement, 86, was scheduled to finally become a U.S. citizen, he was on his deathbed. Literally.

But just months after doctors told him he had just a few weeks to live, a smiling Clement got his citizenship papers Friday and led the entire room of 193 new citizens in the pledge of allegiance.

"This is a great honor for me,'' Clement said.




Svend Clement, 86, of Barrington, raises his hand as he is sworn in as a citizen of the United States.
(Thomas Delany Jr./Sun-Times)
Family members and health care workers say it is a miracle the Barrington Hills resident even made it to the naturalization ceremony at the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services building in downtown Chicago.
Clement is a native of Denmark who spent most of his adult life as the manager of an import and export business in South Africa.

But after his wife, Mary, was attacked and her car stolen in 1998, the couple decided to move to the United States to be closer to their daughter, an American Airlines pilot.

His wife became a U.S. citizen in 2002, but Clement, a permanent resident, kept putting it off, Mary recalled.

"There didn't seem to be any compelling urgency,'' she said.

In January, he finally filed for citizenship. But in March, while he was outside using a chain saw to clear trees at their home, he slipped and hit his head on the ice, causing a concussion.

His wife was out of town, and he did not go to a hospital until the following day. There he underwent brain surgery and suffered congestive heart failure and lung problems.

By the end of April, unable to help him further, doctors released him, first to a nursing home but later to hospice care, which is reserved for patients who have only six months to live.

"We never expected him to live more than two to three weeks,'' Mary Clement said.

But after physical therapy and intensive nursing care, his condition improved, and within the last few weeks, he began to walk again.

Dressed in a gray suit Friday, he smiled throughout the ceremony and appeared relatively healthy. And not only is he a newly minted citizen, "he no longer has a terminal prognosis,'' said Kim Alonzo, his Vitas Healthcare hospice nurse.


"We never expected him to live more than two or three weeks.

"HE NO LONGER HAS A TERMINAL PROGNOSIS.

http://www.suntimes.com/lifestyles/5586 ... 5.article#

Tough guy