Fisher House Family - The Cantinnas

GUEST FAMILY

PROFILE: The Catinna Family

Story by Allan Johnson

Photos by Ashley Estill

Photo by: Ashley Estill

Nick Catinna VI almost waited too long, or maybe his awakening nearly came too late. Either way, when he began training to be a rescue swimmer with the Coast Guard, he was older than everybody in the program and liable to be cut from the final roster simply because of the impressive quality of the other candidates.

But Nick wanted to help people. That’s why he had left his job in a law office and joined the Coast Guard at 27. He transferred to search and rescue/search and recovery because their motto — “So others may live”— impressed him.

“He was involved in a number of saves,” his mother, Jan Catinna, said, while he was serving in Northern California, “but he was honorably discharged because of his PTSD.”

It was after that, when Nick was a young veteran living in Daytona Beach, FL, that he had the accident that has led, after a long coma and many months in different hospitals, to the polytrauma unit at Tampa’s James A. Haley Veterans’ Hospital.

The bumpy road to Tampa for Jan and Nick’s dad, Nick Catinna V, started in Kentucky, but it ended at the Tampa Fisher House, footsteps away from their son. The family connection between the father, mother and their only son was immediately important for everyone.

Nick VI smiled and said, “It overwhelmed me with joy that they were pretty much right across the street from where I was!”

For his parents, staying at the Fisher House offered more than mere convenience and easy access to their son. Jan said she was “humbled by the Fisher House community. I mean,” she said softly, “our son was going to live, but others… well. We really helped each other; we were family to the point where, when four families went home last weekend, I was happy for them, but it was kind of bittersweet.”

Nick’s father was impressed not only by the Fisher House staff, which he said, “bent over backward for us,” but also by the entire Tampa community working with Fisher House. “Lots of churches and organizations were really helpful too,” he said.

Nick V also mentioned something surprising: that staying at a Fisher House had offered him “an opportunity.” The close connections that formed, the shared sorrows and joys, were the last things he expected. He and his wife had been living in their own home for a long time, and he had no idea how either of them were going to react in the “shared living situation” the Fisher House offered.

“But it turned us all into family,” he said.

In recent weeks, Jan reported Nick IV has improved in a number of areas. He can walk with assistance, and he speaks more clearly every week. He’s made such progress, she reported, that he went horseback riding recently. The therapy is working, and the family is together to see it.

Feelings of Gratitude By: Nick Catinna, VI

I would like to say Thank you to the Fisher House Foundation.

My honor is to them; They have been My family’s salvation.

With a traumatic brain injury, I was filled with nothing but fear But because of the Fisher House, My family was always near.

While I stay at the Tampa VA Giving my injuries my best fight, They provide a beautiful place for my parents To sleep at night.

The layouts to the houses are more Than comforting. Their staff and volunteers Are always warm and welcoming.

Each Wednesday the whole house can share a meal That is prepared by organizations that want us to heal.

My best times so far are the weekends there, When so many families spend time and share Their food, their hopes, their woes and their cares. The Fisher House provides fellowship; a blessing so rare.

As I write this poem of gratitude I realize I don’t have a clue How I would have gone through this without my Parents just steps away… I give thanks for the Fisher House each and every day For providing them a safe and caring place to stay.