‘Oh If I Miss Heaven’ singer fights for his life

For many Jamaicans raised in the 1980s and 1990s, Sunday mornings were never complete without the powerful voice of gospel singer Glen Graham echoing through the house. With hits like Oh If I Miss Heaven, Prepare To Meet Me There, and My God is Big, the 69-year-old became a household name, a spiritual staple who moved generations with his stirring vocals.

Today, that same voice is barely a whisper.

Graham, who has been battling a series of life-threatening illnesses, is now pleading for public assistance to raise $1 million for emergency brain surgery that could save his life. Diagnosed with intracranial hemorrhage (bleeding on the brain), he is also suffering from hypertension, diabetes, heart failure, and kidney failure.

"I don't feel good about this at all. The music industry is disorganised and because of that, it hard to even pick out one-one people like me who fall along the way side. I have got little help from a few church people and family and friends, but that's it. I would want to get better and I am asking anyone who can help out with mi surgery fi please help. I am not feeling too bad now but I am still sick and the brain surgery is very important," he said.

Graham's niece and caregiver Everdeen Nesbeth Thomas said she learnt of her uncle's illness in May 2024 while he was hospitalised in the US.

"He said he was in the hospital and then he went home and after that he went in the hospital again where he had a stroke back in late July. He then came back to Jamaica in October, but when I picked him up at the airport, he was a dead man. I mean he was very sick and came out in a wheelchair. Him could barely talk or eat or nutten and him have medication for stroke, cholesterol and kidney issues and other things," she said.

Two days after landing in Jamaica, the singer was admitted to the May Pen Hospital after he passed out. Nesbeth Thomas said he was admitted for a few days.

"He returned home and it look like him a get better but in February of this year he was sent to do some tests on his heart. I had to go on TikTok and beg until I get the money and he got to do it (the tests). On the ninth of May, he collapsed and burst his head and his tongue was out of his head. We thought he was going to die and we rushed him to the hospital where he was treated for seizure and other things," she said.

"Test results a show say him need to do a brain surgery because dem see bleeding on him brain. It a cost all of a million dollars and we don't have that. We nuh get a timeframe but the doctors up at UHWI said as soon as we pay the money, it will be done," she added.

Persons wishing to assist Glen Graham may contact his niece Everdeen Nesbeth Thomas at 876-373-9526 or make donations to NCB savings account #884082587.