Slow Road to Recovery for Hit-and-Run Victim Ted Takacs

Liz Takacs is short on sleep these days. She's also running out of hope, and could use a winning lottery ticket.

Aside from that, she's thankful her husband is alive. 

Ted Takacs, 78, survived what could easily have been a fatal hit-and-run motorcycle accident on Aug. 22.

Being thankful he's alive is one thing; carrying the weight of what's left in the aftermath an accident that left her husband disabled and their future uncertain, is quite another.

"Ted will never regain his independence. They're telling me he will need 24/7 care. I'm not sure what I'm going to do," said Liz Takacs late last week. "What makes it so hard is that while the guys responsible for this are free, Ted is the one who is incarcerated."  

Ted Takacs had just left the Dunkin' Donuts on West Hollis Street on Oct. 22 just after 10, riding his motorcycle with the side car, as usual, heading to the Everett Turnpike at Exit 5 bound for RJ Motorsports, where he's like one of the family. But just as he got onto the ramp, Takacs was sideswiped by a black Chevy SUV. He tumbled from his bike and landed on the highway.

Takacs was left for dead.

On Sept. 20 State Police, with some help from Nashua Police and tips called in by the public, arrested Benjamin Tucker, 23, and Michael Fawcett, 47, both of Nashua, charged in connection with the accident.

One of the two, Fawcett, is the same man arrested for robbing the Lake Street Market just minutes after the hit-and-run accident, state police confirmed. Tucker was arrested again on Oct. 19, for the theft of a television. He was also charged with a similar theft in July.

Meanwhile, Ted Takacs is trying to regain his strength. 

"They said it was a miracle he was alive," said Liz Takacs.  She has until Nov. 5 to figure out what's next – she's trying to find a way to be able to get her husband back home, but because she works full time, and finances are limited, she's not sure what her options are. 

"I am struggling to get help so I can bring him home. I feel like he won't survive in here – it's tough on him, psychologically. He went from being healthy and independent to hardly being able to get around. I am there every morning and every evening, no matter what day it is, to help take care of him. I don't know what else to do," she said. 

She also has to do some work on the house to make modifications to accommodate his new reality, which include a wheelchair and walker. 

It's a far cry from the "bad boy" she fell in love with so many years ago, a man who was part of the uprising against the Soviet government, and survived six months in a Russian prison camp during the Hungarian Revolution of 1956, before he escaped and made his way to the U.S.

Takacs has had a few setbacks in the two months since the crash. He developed a hernia, and his trick knee got trickier. An old eye ailment flared up, and he's lost a lot of strength in his arms, legs and abdomen. Although most of the bumps and bruises have healed, his hands never shook before, like they do now.

"He's going to need physical therapy for his knee," says his wife, during a visit a few Saturdays ago, a problem for which her husband has a better answer. 

"I need a Black Russian, and I need to get out of here," he says, smiling faintly from his wheelchair, while massaging his right knee. 

"Yes, I think so so, too," says his wife, reaching over hold on to his hand for a reassuring moment. 

Liz Takacs said she learned from the Trooper who first came to her husband's aid that the first thing he asked about was his granddaughter, Kaleigh. 

"The second thing was the Munchkins, and then his dog, Gizmo," she said. 

Her husband has no memory of any of that – not the accident, or the couple of weeks he spent in and out of hospitals until he landed at Greenbriar in Nashua. But when talk turns to the way he was left in the street, something rises like a quiet storm in Takacs.

"They should let me handle him," Takacs said of the man accused of hitting him and driving off. "Or maybe they should send him to work, to pay me back for these hospital bills. Yes, I do feel angry. When it happened, he should have stopped and not just taken off."

"And he feels angry that I have to work so hard to keep things going, now that he can't help," his wife says. "If you're someone who's paid your own way your whole life, and never asked for anything, to end up this way is a crime," she said.

She said they've both worked two or three jobs at any given time over their married life, as well as volunteered and rescued animals. 

"We've tried to pay it forward our whole lives. This is going to be tough," she said.

She's angry, too – that someone has robbed her husband of these golden years. Liz Takacs recently got her masters degree in business and healthcare, and is working a job outside of her field, at Best Buy, to make ends meet. Her husband kept the home fires burning, paying bills, walking the dogs and riding his motorcycle.

Takacs says he just wants to go back home, get back on his bike and find a part-time job.

"RJ's Motorsports has already told him they're going to fix his bike up for him. He doesn't want to give up riding – he's been riding for 60 years," she said.

Takac's children have set up a gofundme.com site to try and gather some financial resources to keep them going.

"I'm so grateful to the State Troopers for making an arrest. I'm so grateful Ted's alive, and so many people have been so kind to us. I just don't know what we're going to do, and the worst is how frustrated Ted is – if you knew how vital he was before the accident, then you'd see," she said.

Donations can be made at www.gofundme.com/TheodoreTakacs.