Most people have spent the last few months looking forward to the holidays and planning New Year’s resolutions. But for Pflugerville resident Efe Obayagbona and his wife, Ivie Osagie, there sights are set on the end of January, when he will have surgery in the hopes of fully regaining the use of his right hand.
Obayagbona was among 25 people wounded on Aug. 31 in a mass shooting that spread between Midland and Odessa. Seven others were killed.
The shooter had been fired from his job that day, authorities had said. When state troopers tried to pull over Seth Ator for failing to use a turn signal, the man went on a shooting rampage that involved killing a postal worker and hijacking a mail van. Officers eventually shot and killed Ator in a movie theater parking lot.
Obayagbona was driving an 18-wheeler along his normal route when the shooting rampage began. Bullets hit his left arm, shattered his right wrist and broke one of his ribs. He said there are still bullet fragments in his lung.
“It has been a little bit rough, but I just thank God I’m alive,” he said. “I thank God every day.”
Obayagbona has mostly lost feeling in his right hand, he said, and is unable to write or do other menial tasks. He said he gets winded after strenuous activity, though doctors have said they expect his lungs will heal completely.
Recovery has been long and painful. Obayagbona faces another year of physical therapy, which means missing more work as a commercial truck driver.
Osagie said the process of healing for her husband has been difficult. “People don’t realize that the healing part is the most painful part,” she said.
Obayagbona has nightmares about the shooting, she said. Whenever they get in a car, she said she can tell he is on high alert.
“It is something that can happen to anyone, and so you just want to watch out,” Obayagbona said.
Osagie said it is difficult for him to watch the news when there are other shootings. “It’s so hard for him because he can relate to the victims,” she said. “He thinks, ‘I was there.’”
The recovery process has also had its fair share of stress, Osagie said, particularly from a financial standpoint. “It is driving him crazy because he is used to being the one out there providing for the family,” she said.
The couple have fielded questions over the months from their three young children, who ask their mother why Dad was shot. She said one child continues thinking that he must have done something bad, because the young girl doesn’t comprehend how a good person can get shot.
When Obayagbona first came home from the hospital, the children were scared of all of his bandages, Osagie said, but they are getting more comfortable now that the bandages are gone.
Osagie said a victims’ relief fund has been paying their medical bills. The family has been living off a GoFundMe page that has raised nearly $64,000 as of Thursday.
She said her family is grateful for the community support. If not for the charity of others, she said, she doesn’t know what they would have done.
“I don’t know when he will be able to work again. I don’t know when he will heal from his next surgery,” Osagie said.
After recovery, Obayagbona said he will go back to truck driving. But until then, he will continue the long, arduous process of recovery.
“I would say it is a situation I would not wish my worst enemy to be in,” he said.
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