AGAWAM – Members of the community are working to raise money for a Stop and Shop employee who was injured weeks ago when a car crashed into the entrance of the building.

Dave McCausland said his roommate and friend, Sue Stenta, was walking into work on the morning of July 29, putting on her mask, when she was struck from behind by a car. McCausland said he didn’t hear about the accident until later that night.

He said he couldn’t find much about the accident online and “no one really knew what was going on,” but he “sprang into action” anyway.

“The only thing I found was a blurb. I set up a basic GoFundMe to get it up and running,” he said. McCausland said the first night Stenta was in the hospital was “touch and go.” Among Stenta’s injuries were a broken arm, a broken leg, multiple broken ribs, a bruised lung, a lacerated spleen, and other cuts and stitches.

“She said ‘I don’t know what else is wrong with me, there could be more,’” he said. “They were looking to see that they wouldn’t have to take her spleen out.” Following the accident, McCausland said Stenta spent several days in the trauma center of the hospital and then several days in a rehabilitation center.

However, she needed to heal further before she could get further rehabilitation. This, he said, led to Stenta being out of work for an undetermined amount of time. Further adding to the hardship the pair are facing is that McCausland said he will likely need to take time off of work to become Stenta’s caregiver.

“What’s going to happen is I’m probably going to become Sue’s full-time caregiver, taking my time,” he said. “It puts me in a position where I can’t work myself.” However, he said it was worth it “to give her a sense of security until things get finalized.”

He said Stenta would be out of work for a while, and her future was still uncertain. “She’s going to be out for a long time, a really long time. She possibly has to have some more surgeries,” he said.

While there is a potential for Stenta to receive Workman’s Compensation, the accident is still under investigation so that would likely not happen for a while. However, he said, “there’s no guarantee that’s going to happen.”

Stenta told Reminder Publishing that she’d only received a single text message from a manager the night after the accident took place. Following that, she had received no communication from Stop and Stop. Ultimately though, Stenta said she was “glad to be home.”

While Stenta heals, McCausland has been working hard to raise money to pay for the impending medical bills he knows are coming. He’s hoping the community will help him raise money to show Stenta how important she is and how much she matters. “She’s got some serious injuries, right now we hope the community can in their hearts of hearts give what they can. This is a special person, if you met Sue in person you’d want to give her the world,” he said. “Imagine this happened to you. She needs support and prayer and everything, but prayers don’t pay the bills.”

 Ultimately, he said he hoped “some people can see how amazing she is,” and he didn’t “want her to fall through the cracks.” At time of press the GoFundMe had raised $2,035. Those interested in donating can do so at https://www.gofundme.com/f/stopshopsue?fbclid=IwAR3VtKq_ZbxFWSNDZTiVKym9hSmYjfYogruYR9--YCZj4arPt40ma3ZSkHE.