How Threads of Life gives severely-injured workers hope

This weekend June Easter will tell the story of how her husband recovered from a workplace accident that almost killed him, and the crucial support he and his family received from others who had similar experiences.

Easter will be the guest speaker at a Threads of Life event Saturday in Charlottetown. She credits the group, which allows severely injured workers to share their stories, with giving her husband the push he needed to carry on. He was three years into the recovery process when he attended his first Threads of Life meeting.

"He was very hesitant and he was the place where he thought, 'Oh, what will I ever do with my life,'" said June Easter.

"When he left there he had hope."

In 2011 Vance Easter was working in his welding shop when a piece of slagburnedthrough the oxygen-acetylene hose. It became like a blow torch, giving him third- and fourth-degree burns over two thirds of his body.

Beating the odds

June Easter described how the burn specialist pushed his prognosis forward only a tiny bit at a time.

"He said he has a chance, that went to he'll survive the night, he'll survive the day, he'll survive the next few days, he'll survive the week, then he'll survive but he may be long-term care," she said.

"Very much up in the air for about the first two, three months of just what the long term was going to be."

Vance continued to beat the odds, learning to walk again against doctors' expectations, and even to dance at his daughter's wedding.

June said Threads of Life was an important part of the inspiration that kept him going.

"He met people who were in similar incidents," she said.

"He just had to keep his determination and his positive attitude."

On Saturday June will lend her support to Threads of Life. She will be the guest speaker at the Steps forLife event, a five-kilometre walk to support the organization.

Registration opens at 9 a.m. at the Queen Charlotte Armouries in Charlottetown, and the event starts at 10 a.m. A barbecue will follow the walk.

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