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A brave little Blount County boy, who loved more than anything spending time with his identical twin, lost his fight for life at 6:31 a.m. Monday after contracting E. coli and suffering the after-effects of the disease.

His heart just gave out.

Joseph Coning, 8, and his twin, Jesse, were looking forward to a family vacation on the Outer Banks of North Carolina. Both boys love to swim and left their home in Carpenter's Campground community with their maternal grandparents, Tom and Sandi Koeshall, who live on Six Mile Road.

His mother and father, Nicole and Bobby Coning of Carpenter's Campground Road, were to join the family early in the week.

"We rented a house with a pool," Nicole said. "Monday Joseph was playing and having a good time with Jesse in the pool and Tuesday was when everything started to decline pretty quickly."

Joseph had suffered a case of diarrhea Saturday, May 31, and the following Sunday and Monday. The family thought it was just the typical childhood disease and Joseph would be well soon. That proved not to be the case.

He was taken to Nags Head Hospital and then on June 3 he was transferred to Children's Hospital of the King's Daughters in Norfolk, Va.

Nicole said "he had profuse pain in his stomach and bloody diarrhea. They thought it was c-diff (clostridium difficile), a bacterial infection."

The family wanted to bring the boy home to East Tennessee Children's Hospital for treatment.

Boy flown home

Joseph's paternal grandmother, Betty Coning, worked with Carpenter's United Methodist Church to raise the $7,500 the family needed up front to fly Joseph home.

On June 6 when he was transferred by air ambulance to Children's Hospital in Knoxville.

A Children's Hospital physician, after looking at the boy's records, was certain that Joseph was suffering from HUS (hemolytic uremic syndrome), a secondary disease caused by E. coli. HUS destroys red blood cells and causes renal failure, Nicole said.

Joseph reached Children's at 8 p.m. June 6 and they immediately began X-rays, checking his blood constantly and other tests, she said.

The hospital in Nags Head called that day to confirm that their tests came back showing he suffered from E. coli.

His blood levels were out of whack, as well as his kidney functions.

On Monday, June 8, doctors began peritoneal dialysis, which they continued almost constantly for the whole of the last week, Nicole said.

Joseph was given blood transfusions and had heart and blood sugar level problems.

Signs of disease

On Sunday, June 14, Joseph went from being very calm and sleeping 24 hours a day to being very agitated and restless, a sign of the disease, Nicole said.

"E.coli attacks your organs. He was holding in so much fluid that his stomach was distended and pushing up on his lungs, causing him to have difficulty breathing," she said. "Sunday evening and Monday morning he was not coherent, which is also part of the disease process."

He was so agitated and itching, another symptom of the disease, and keep pulling at his catheter, causing it to start leaking. This forced doctors to stop the dialysis.

Joseph actually pulled the tube loose and doctors wanted to do surgery to put in another tube. When they started the anesthesia, "his heart rate went from 160 to 80 to 0 in the blink of an eye," she said. They gave him two shots of adrenalin and did chest compressions to bring the boy back.

Doctors were able to put a tube lower in his abdomen and he was moved to the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit, where he was put on a ventilator.

The family saw him about 3:30 a.m. Monday.

The medical staff was still doing everything they could to get him stabilized. "A couple of hours later the doctor came out and said it was not looking good. We were able to be there with him. He was not coherent," Nicole said.

They kept losing him and giving him adrenalin to bring him back to life, but his heart could not take it.

After he was declared dead at 6:31 a.m., the family "said their final good-byes," she said.

Autopsy planned

The family does not know where Joseph contracted E. coli and an autopsy will be done to try and find answers.

Nicole is very concerned for the remaining twin, Jesse. "They were best friends. They were inseparable," she said.

"He was a huge Veggie Tales fan," Nicole said. "He loved to read, but mostly he loved spending time with his twin brother."

Her voice broke as she spoke of Joseph. "He touched so many people. His courage and bravery through all of this was just remarkable."

A good student, Joseph was looking forward to starting third grade at Carpenter's Elementary School. Now Jesse will be left to do that alone.

Funeral arrangements will be made today at Smith Mortuary.

In lieu of flowers, people are asked to donate to the Joseph Coning Memorial Fund, which was established at Regions Bank.