The Injury and Rehabilitation of a Paralyzed Veteran
A medic helicopter rushed in to take DeLancey to the hospital. He flatlined multiple times on the way to the Al-Asad airbase. Once stabilized, he was flown to Landstuhl, Germany for surgery. Eventually, he returned to the U.S. for treatment of his injuries at Walter Reed Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, where he was place in a medically induced coma. Once sedation was weaned, DeLancey’s family, friends, and medical team encouraged him to discontinue use of the ventilator that was placed when doctors worked on his injuries. When DeLancey came off the ventilator, he was given the choice of four rehabilitation hospitals, and he went to his home state of Florida for extensive rehabilitation.
For DeLancey, an important part of rehabilitation included maintaining an active lifestyle and participating in sports. He began going to events put on by the Wounded Warrior Project, an organization dedicated to supporting the wellbeing of Veterans through mental health services, physical wellness, and peer support. DeLancey not only began participating in adaptive sports like hand cycling, wheelchair rugby, and wheelchair basketball, but he also became a peer mentor for fellow Veterans, traveling to Bethesda Maryland and the Tampa VA hospital, to support Veterans going through similar experiences.
