‘I was pretty much paralysed’

TAMARA DAVIDSON witnessed the death of her partner and suffered a spinal cord injury which called for months of rehabilitation.

Left physically scarred, mentally drained and emotionally broken, she recognised that her recovery demanded a recommitment of her life to God.

She considers herself a testament to His miraculous power and has authored a memoir which tells the story of love, tragedy, and God’s hand in restoring hope.

TRAGEDY STRUCK

On October 9, 2013, just days after Davidson and her partner, Jermaine Bartley, selected their wedding rings, tragedy struck at their Irwin Meadows home in Granville, St James.

Bartley, who was on vacation leave, drove her to work and later that evening after they had dinner, she asked him to discard the food scraps outside.

“Three gunmen came back in with him. I just stood there. I was in shock. I was just looking at the three guns pointing at us. I could see that he was scared and nervous. He was on vacation, so I’m not even sure if he actually had a gun with him because it was a keep and care,” the 39-year-old business analyst recounted.

She told The Gleaner that one gunman ordered them to lie flat on the floor, while the others took their phones, searched their drawers and asked for money, as well as Bartley’s gun.

She recalled that her partner was kicked in the head several times and he begged the gunmen not to harm her.

Amid his pleas, she heard the first gunshot and then a second. Bartley was shot twice in the head.

“I was like ‘Alright God, I guess I am next’. I prayed and I prayed and then there was a bit of silence. They shot me in my neck and I was trying to move and I realised that I couldn’t move,” she shared.

As the gunmen exited the house, they fired again and another bullet went through the right side of her head.

Davidson shared that waiting for help felt like forever and when a policeman arrived, he presumed that they were both dead.

Moments later, he was joined by a colleague who recognised that Davidson was still breathing and she was rushed to Cornwall Regional Hospital.

She suffered a C5-C6 spinal cord injury and had to undergo surgery to remove the bullet from her neck.

Davidson spent two weeks in the intensive care unit and another week on ward, before she was transferred to Sir John Golding Rehabilitation Centre, where she received treatment over the course of five months.

“I went to rehab on a stretcher. I was pretty much paralysed. When I was assessed, only my mouth was moving and I had a little movement in my left leg. When I was able to sit up a little bit, they transitioned me to a wheelchair and then a quad cane,” she recounted.

At the time of the incident, she was a workforce analyst at Conduent and her employer stood by her by paying her full salary for nine months until she returned to work.

Davidson also had the support of her family and friends who made daily visits to the rehab.

MEMBER OF JCF

Bartley, 27, was a member of the Jamaica Constabulary Force for four years.

“Jermaine meant everything to me. His death took a toll on me and I stayed out of relationships for a very long time because it was hard to move on. He gave his last to ensure that everyone was okay,” she said in a low tone, adding that they had been in a relationship for almost six and a half years.

It has been almost a decade and Davidson said a motive for her partner’s killing is yet to be established.

She told The Gleaner that she felt a need to share her story and had been encouraged several times to write a book, but she did not put pen to paper until February 2023.

Her book, Purpose Cannot Die: Shot by gunmen, presumed dead – but God, was published on May 3.

It is dedicated to Jermaine and her mother, Audrey Davidson, whom she describes as her tower of strength.

She told The Gleaner that she was a backslider, but recommitted her life to God and it was her unwavering faith that aided her recovery.

“I believe God sometimes allows tragedy to reveal our limitations as humans. When I got baptised again four years after the incident, I came to the place where I was able to forgive my shooters,” she said.

Today, Davidson walks with a limp, suffers from chronic back pain and her left hand has become her dominant hand because the fingers on her right do not work well.

Davidson also shared that she began driving five years ago and has travelled distances as far as Kingston to Montego Bay.

It is her hope that readers will recognise that God specialises in the impossible and that forgiveness is critical, no matter how much a person believes he or she has been wronged.

Davidson’s 150-page book is available on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0C2SM68H2?ref_=cm_sw_r_mwn_dp_53K335YC2H9P2ZJ...

judana.murphy@gleanerjm.com