Trinity teen’s family has a lot to be thankful for | Features

The most critical of these tools was the ECMO (extracorporeal membrane oxygenation) machine, which kept Caleb alive by supporting his heart and lungs, which were too weak to function on their own.

Without ECMO, Caleb would have already been dead.

But what’s special about ECMO is that it’s intended as a short-term life support device, usually used for about a week. Although a patient can receive ECMO for several weeks if necessary, the risk of complications increases with each passing day. By Thanksgiving, Caleb had already been on ECMO for three weeks, and it didn’t seem like doctors would be able to get him off the technology any time soon.

From across the room, David and Shana Dulin could only watch and pray as their youngest son unconsciously fought for his life. Caleb had contracted pneumonia and was battling acute respiratory distress syndrome, a life-threatening lung disease.

“It was terrible,” said David. “When he got to ECMO, it was day by day and minute by minute. Things just didn’t look good on Thanksgiving Day.”

On Thanksgiving, as a team attempted to place an arterial line, Caleb suffered a seizure and a mild brain hemorrhage. He survived the ordeal, but of course it wasn’t the happiest Thanksgiving for the Dulin family.

Either David or Shana – often both – stayed with their son around the clock.

“We talked to him and played music for him,” Shana said. “We prayed for him every night.”

They also read to him the countless cards, emails and texts of support he had sent from his Wheatmore classmates, friends and other family members, and members of Dulin’s Mount Zion Wesleyan church in Thomasville. Support also came from David’s colleagues in the police department and Shana’s fellow teachers at Hopewell Elementary School in Trinity. Fundraisers were organized to cover the family’s medical expenses.

Despite the overwhelming support from the community, David remembers this time as one of the darkest days of his life.

“It got to the point where we had to decide whether or not we wanted to take Caleb off ECMO,” he recalled. “We had prayed that he would survive and we had prayed to God that he would take him if that was his will. Finally.” I prayed a specific prayer: “Lord, your word teaches us that your sheep know your voice, but I do not hear you. “Is it time to take him off ECMO?” Within 30 minutes, Caleb was moving for the first time in about 50 days.”

On December 30th – two months after the accident – ​​Caleb was removed from ECMO after 51 days on the machine. A month later, he would leave the hospital and head to Shepherd Center, a rehabilitation facility in Atlanta that specializes in brain injuries.

At the Shepherd Center, he completed inpatient physical therapy for almost two months and outpatient therapy for a little longer.

“He literally had to relearn everything,” David explained. “Speaking of. Swallowing. Blinking. Walking. Talking. Breathing. Using the toilet. Showering. Bathing himself. Combing his hair. Brushing his teeth. It was amazing to me how much his body had to relearn.”

Caleb, now 17, agreed.

“I was like a baby being reborn,” he said. “I couldn’t do anything.”

Caleb, who was already thin before the accident, lost 30 to 40 pounds through tube feeding, so he also had to try to gain some of that weight back.

Caleb remembers his frustrating days in rehab.

“The whole time I felt like I was taking two steps back even though I wanted to move forward,” he said. “I felt like I would never move forward.”

This seemed particularly true when it came to the use of his hands.

“I like to draw and play video games,” Caleb said. “I’m right-handed, but at first I could barely move my right hand, which was scary. I wondered if I would ever be able to draw or play video games again.”

One thing that cheered Caleb up during his rehab happened in February when the Wheatmore student body held a pep rally for him. As Caleb watched a livestream of the event from Atlanta, students cheered him on and waved signs of support.

Caleb completed his outpatient therapy at the end of May and is quickly finding a sense of normality in his life. In August he returned to school at Wheatmore, where he is now a junior. He has regained his ability to draw and play video games.

He has also begun speaking at local churches and sharing his experiences about what he believes God has done for him.

“The Bible says when God gives you a story, share that story with others,” Caleb said. “He saved my life, so I want to praise him for that.”

David and Shana share this feeling of gratitude.

“We are grateful to God and we are grateful to the community for their overwhelming support,” David said. “We are especially grateful that we still have our son. He was in critical condition on Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years, our 25th wedding anniversary and three of our children’s birthdays. So when I say that we will celebrate this holiday as a family and that he is doing as well as he is…yes, we are grateful.”