Volunteers Help Repay a Disabled Veteran's Sacrifice (page 2 of 2)

After six weeks, Matt had gained limited use of his left arm and was stable enough to leave Walter Reed. He spent another six weeks at a trauma center in Tampa, Florida, and from there traveled with Tracy to Craig Hospital in Englewood, Colorado, one of the nation's top rehabilitation facilities. Within a month, he was off the ventilator and was learning how to handle what he called his new normal—everything from answering a phone to getting into a car. With a pencil or a fork strapped to his partially mobile left hand, he learned to push buttons and to feed himself.

Meanwhile, Tracy struggled to find an apartment for their life after rehab. Most places had hallways that were too narrow for a motorized wheelchair or kitchens that were obstacle courses. Retrofitting everything would be dauntingly complicated and expensive. "It was depressing," Matt recalls.

One day, Debbie Quackenbush, founder of American Military Family, Inc. (AMI)—a nonprofit that aids Colorado soldiers and their families—dropped off a gift of $1,000. When she asked if there was anything else the Keils needed, Tracy answered, "A place to live would be nice." Quackenbush promised to see what she could do. Then she placed a call to John Gonsalves.

More than 33,000 U.S. soldiers have been injured in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, about 3,000 so severely that they need permanent care. For those who have trouble navigating ordinary houses or apartments, it can cost $50,000 to $100,000 to retrofit a home or incorporate suitable features into a new one. The federal government gives grants of up to $60,000 for vets who own homes to create handicapped-accessible living quarters, but those who rent or move in with their parents receive a maximum reimbursement of $14,000.

John Gonsalves believes injured veterans deserve more substantial compensation. In 2003 he saw a TV news report about a soldier in Iraq who'd lost both legs to a rocket-propelled grenade. Gonsalves, then a 37-year-old construction supervisor in Taunton, Massachusetts, decided to volunteer his time to the group that would build the man a wheelchair-friendly home when he returned. After finding that no such organization existed, he started one.

Homes for Our Troops was the first nonprofit to construct houses for seriously disabled veterans. (A handful of other groups have since followed suit.) The organization relies largely on donated materials and labor, using its own funds to pay for land and other expenses. The homes are custom-designed to fit the needs of the veterans, who contribute any grant money they receive from the government but otherwise pay nothing and own the home outright. “It doesn't matter if you're for the war or not,” Gonsalves says. "These people put their lives on the line to preserve our freedom. We have to return the favor."

The Keils had no idea that Homes for Our Troops had them in mind until one night in August 2007. At a fund-raising dinner for AMI, Gonsalves called the couple to the stage and said, "We heard about you guys, and we want to build you a house." As slides of projects that he'd completed appeared on a screen, the audience erupted in cheers.

"We just about died of happiness then and there," Tracy recalls. The Keils left Craig Hospital a month later and moved into a ground-floor apartment in nearby Parker, the town where their house would be built. Tending to Matt's needs was a full-time job for Tracy (who by then had quit her accounting position), even with daily visits from home-health-care aides. Their landlord had remodeled the apartment's shower, but Matt couldn't even turn on the lights by himself.

Life in the new place would be different. Beyond being built with handicapped-accessible features like wider doorways, the house was designed to reduce Matt's dependence on Tracy and Tracy's dependence on outside help. The electrical system could be operated by voice commands, the doors by a keypad that Matt would carry with him. In the master bedroom, an electric lift would run along tracks on the ceiling, allowing Tracy to get him out of bed and into the bathroom.

A civilian army mobilized itself for the couple. A construction executive heard about them and committed his company to the project. Suppliers agreed to contribute materials. Contractors offered free services. Homes for Our Troops sent two "road warriors"—full-time volunteers who travel the country in RVs, camping at building sites-to oversee the workers. The first was Erik Freeman, 60, a retired construction supervisor and Vietnam vet whose wife had recently died. "I'm lucky to have this," he said when people asked him how he was holding up. "This is family."

The volunteer corps, which had expanded in size to include friends, neighbors, and strangers who wanted to help out, broke ground in April and finished the framing by July. By the end of summer, the Keils' dream had taken shape on five acres of rolling grassland.
"It's magnificent," Matt murmured one evening as the sunset cast a glow on the roof. He was too choked up to say more.

Speeches over, Matt and Tracy cross the threshold, followed by the road warriors, who lead guests on a tour of the house. They point out the elevator to the basement and the granite kitchen counters, built with an overhang so Matt can roll up for a meal. Friends bring in their housewarming gifts, including a glass-fronted box made by a buddy of Matt's who served with him in Iraq. It contains Matt's Purple Heart and combat ribbons. In the living room, Tracy gestures toward the big windows with a sweeping view of the Front Range mountains.
Soon most of the well-wishers leave, and family members begin unloading furniture and boxes from a moving truck. As Matt watches, he talks about the future.

"This is the house we're going to grow old in," he says quietly. "This is where we're going to raise a family." The couple plan to try in vitro fertilization, and if that doesn't work, they'll adopt a child with disabilities.

From Reader's Digest - February 2009

 

• • Inspiring Stories
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• Military
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• • Medical Dramas

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• Hope Floats
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• A Place in the Sun for War Veterans
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