The setting couldn't have been more beautiful. Jared Dunten was sitting in the hot springs on the edge of the Rio Grande in Big Bend National Park. He was on his first vacation from his job as a copywriter at GSD&M. He stood up, dove into the river and didn't come back up.
A friend managed to get Jared's head above the water so he could breathe. On his dive, he'd hit a rock. The C4 and C5 vertebrae in his neck were broken, and they were 90 miles from the nearest medical attention.
Eventually, they were able to summon park rangers, and Jared was transported to Alpine, then to the ICU in Lubbock where he stayed for a month. He was paralyzed from the neck down and suffering from pneumonia. The doctors gave him little hope for recovery.
There was another six months in a Houston rehab hospital and, finally, a chance to return home to Austin. Jared was determined to resume as normal a life as possible — an attitude that helped him through his grueling rehab regimen. Already, the DREAM Fund was at work. A van had been purchased and specially modified for Jared's wheelchair. It meant the difference between more months of being stranded at home and a return to his job at GSD&M.
"It was a breath of fresh air. When it seemed everything else took forever, they got the van very quickly," Jared says.
"It was pretty much ready for me when I got home. The DREAM Fund and my agency were both great and really came through for me."
These days, he's working about 30 hours a week and looking forward to the day when he won't need his wheelchair. Who knows, there may even be another Big Bend trip in the offing.