LABRADOR CITY, N.L. — When contacted about a current fundraiser his friends have started on his behalf, Dale Dalton of Labrador City begins his story five years ago.
Complications from serious drug addiction and overdose saw him airlifted from the hospital in Labrador City to the Health Sciences Centre in St. John’s.
Dalton had fallen in his home and severely injured the muscles in his leg, cutting off the circulation in the bottom part of the limb. He underwent an operation to repair the leg. He also had several feet of his small intestine removed.
“I woke up out of a coma 10 days later. My stomach was cut wide open,” he said.
Dalton’s vital organs including his kidneys, liver, and pancreas had shut down.
“The only things still functioning were my brain and my heart,” he said during a phone interview on Dec. 8.
He wasn’t expected to survive, he said. But he defied the odds.
“My body started to come back ... they had me on dialysis and my kidneys started to function again and my liver and pancreas.”
After being treated in the Health Sciences Centre for six or seven weeks, he was transferred to the Dr. Leonard A. Miller Centre for rehabilitation needed as a result of the surgery on his leg.
In 2017 Dalton developed an infection in his small toe. The infection was eventually diagnosed as a disease of the bone called osteomyelitis which led to the amputation of his small toe and the side of his foot.
While things moved along enough for him to return to his job as an ironworker, the disease eventually worsened and resulted in the amputation of his lower right limb in April 2019.
“I had to learn to walk with one leg and I had to depend on the crutches. I had a lot of trouble with falling ... But it’s all healed up now,” he said.
He is now waiting on a prosthetic limb which, he said, will cost him about $16,000 and will see him travel from his home in Labrador City to the Miller Centre in St. John’s to have his new limb fitted and to undergo rehabilitation.
His friend Trudy Bridger has started a Go Fund Me initiative to help raise some of that money. The fundraiser has brought in over $1,500 of the $2,000 goal.
“I’m ever so grateful to everybody who is trying to help me out. I’m really honoured that Trudy is doing this for me. It shows real compassion on a friend’s part.”
Dalton is also grateful to his former spouse and best friend Sharon Pynn. She has stood by him over the years, he said.
“She’s the reason why I’m alive today.”
Pynn, who also struggles with addiction, said Dalton is an inspiration to a lot of people.
Despite his amputation, she said, he mowed the lawn this past summer from his wheelchair and strung Christmas lights on her home.
Dalton is kind, careful and thoughtful, a man who has helped many others through the years, she said.
“I couldn’t be prouder of him. He’s always been a great person. That’s one thing addiction couldn’t take from him ... he is my best friend,” shared Pynn.
Dalton is currently seeking treatment for his addiction. During the phone interview, he explained he is almost through his program at an adult addictions treatment centre in Conception Bay North, NL.
He is confident he now has the knowledge he needs to stay on a healthy path and live his life one day at a time.
“For once in my life, I’ve done something for myself. I’ve got all the tools I need to live a happy life and I’m going to live it to the fullest,” he said.
To donate to the fundraiser visit www.gofundme.com/f/fundraiser-for-dale-dalton
