Healing Beyond the Flames

It was a sunny August afternoon, and two-year-old Hunter was fast asleep. His mother, Robyn, had stepped outside to hang washing and paused to talk to her aunt next door. Their conversation was suddenly interrupted by a scream from the other side of the house.

Robyn frowned. “I thought, ‘Why is this lady screaming? Why is she calling me?’” she recalls. Annoyed, she reluctantly broke off her conversation and walked towards the house. As she looked up, her heart sank. The room where Hunter was sleeping was engulfed in flames.

Without hesitating, Robyn ran inside and up the stairs. When she flung the door open, a suffocating cloud of hot black smoke hit her. She plunged in. “I couldn’t see. It was dark. I was feeling for him because he wasn’t on the bed where I left him. I found him behind the door.”

Hunter had tried to escape before losing consciousness and collapsing behind the door as the flames closed in around him. Robyn grabbed him and fled. In the next bedroom, Robyn’s aunt had already rescued Hunter’s two older siblings, both unharmed.

“My dad came and took us to the hospital.” Robyn closes her eyes before continuing, her lip trembling. “For nine and a half days, he was in an induced coma. He was skin grafted twice. On many occasions, he was scrubbed. He had operations.” It was six weeks before they were able to go home.

After two months of intensive treatment, Hunter is almost ready to begin laser therapy to soften the scars that mark his face and body. But his physical healing is also only part of the journey. Sometimes, Hunter shakes and jerks or cries in his sleep as memories come back to haunt his dreams. “Sometimes, when we’re on the N2, he’ll just go limp in the car because he’s afraid that we’re going to the hospital.”

Hunter suddenly interrupts the story, grabbing his mom’s face in both hands and kissing her. Robyn’s face softens and she laughs, “This is the part I missed when he was in ICU. His hands were bandaged finger by finger, but this is what he likes to do.”

Doctors say Hunter will need ongoing treatment for another two to three years. In the meantime, Robyn is focusing on rebuilding their lives. “It’s not easy. I have to take it step by step every day. My children distract me from thinking about what could have been. I feel okay, because my child is alive, and I feel privileged to be in a hospital that treated us so well. I appreciate everything.”

The fire destroyed the family’s personal possessions, including their clothing. Through the Family Care Project, they received grocery vouchers, linen, towels, clothing, shoes, toiletries, and assistance with transport costs. “It helps a lot,” Robyn says, beaming. “My grandma bought my kids each a change of clothes and Crocs. Every time they wore something, we would have to wash it at night so they would have something to wear the next day.” She laughs, her voice lighter. “It’s such a relief not to have to hang over the bath to wash something for them to wear. We got tracksuits, shorts, sweaters, caps, socks, and slippers. A lot of things.”