Smithtown couple reunited with neurosurgeon who saved both after crash

Maryann and Leon Esquibel of Smithtown have been through it all together.

Childhood sweethearts from Manhattan's Lower East Side, the couple started dating when they were teenagers and have been virtually inseparable ever since. 

So it's little surprise that when the Esquibels were involved in a serious car accident in 2020, the couple both appeared to sustain only minor injuries, only to learn weeks later that they were each suffering from potentially life-threatening brain bleeds. 

To further punctuate their bond, the couple had back-to-back surgeries on Sept. 10, 2020 at St. Catherine of Siena Hospital in Smithtown to repair their respective subdural hematomas — each performed by Dr. Magdy Shady, chief of the neurology department.

On Wednesday, Maryann, 85, and Leon, 87, Esquibel were reunited with Shady and the medical team who saved their lives as the hospital hosted a celebration for the couple's 65th wedding anniversary.

"[The accident] just brought us closer together," Maryann Esquibel said, surrounded by her family, which includes four children, nine grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.

On Aug. 5, 2020, the Esquibels were on their way to breakfast on a stormy morning — Tropical Storm Isaias had made landfall the previous day, knocking out power to much of the island — when their car was struck from behind on Route 347 in Smithtown. The Esquibels' vehicle spun around and Maryann temporarily lost consciousness. 

Jerry Esquibel, 63, of Mount Sinai, one of the couple's two sons, was among the first on the scene.

"It was chaotic. The lights were out at the intersection," he recalled. "To see both of your parents taken away in an ambulance, especially during COVID, was worrisome."

The couple was taken to St. Catherine, where Leon Esquibel was diagnosed with a bruise on the brain — not yet a bleed — and admitted for a single day. Maryann Esquibel appeared to come out largely unscathed and was discharged after only a few hours.

But their luck was short-lived.

A few weeks later, Maryann Esquibel fell down in the garage after her left side went numb. Scans showed a subdural hematoma — a bleed that occurs in the skull — on the right side of her brain. A CT scan would show a similar diagnosis for Leon Esquibel.

"I didn't even think I had symptoms," said Leon Esquibel. "I was always aware of everything and then all of a sudden … we took a scan and Dr. Shady says 'you're going go to the hospital right now.'"

By sheer coincidence, if not fate, Shady performed surgeries on the couple within hours of one another, a first in his 30-plus years of practicing medicine.

"Usually, when you're operating on the husband, the wife is there taking care of everything," Shady said. "When you're operating on the wife, it's vice versa. When you have them both, you have the entire family in your hands, so to speak. So it's obviously more of concern."

Randy Howard, St. Catherine's chief operating officer, said the Esquibels recuperated together, rarely leaving each other's side.

"They recovered together in our hospital here and supported one another throughout," Howard said. "And of course they truly have lived their wedding vows to 'have and to hold from this day forward for better or for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health and to love and to cherish.'"

The Esquibels are now fully recovered and enjoying retirement. On Wednesday, the couple's family presented them with a booklet of heartfelt messages from their children and grandchildren acknowledging their milestone anniversary and indelible love story.

Maryann Esquibel said the key to 65 years of happy marriage is not complicated.

"Nobody's the boss. We're equal," she said. "He likes to cook. I like to clean. We just get along. We don't even have to speak sometimes. We just know what each other is thinking. … We're just compatible."

By Robert Brodsky

robert.brodsky@newsday.com@BrodskyRobert

Robert Brodsky is a breaking news reporter who has worked at Newsday since 2011. He is a Queens College and American University alum.