FOUR weeks after being horrifically burned in a bushfire, Bernie Schulte ate his first real food yesterday – fed to him by his son Cameron.
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Bernie’s wife Bronwyn, who has been by the pair’s bedside since the fire on December 8, said it was an incredible moment.
“It was beautiful Cameron was able to do it,” she said. “The nurses went to feed him and Cameron said: ‘He’s my dad, I’ll do it’.”
The moment wasn’t lost on anyone for it was Cameron who saved his father’s life by racing into a raging bushfire to pull him out.
Despite sustaining burns to 38 per cent of his body, Cameron carried Bernie to a water trough, dialled 000 on his mobile phone and then carried his father to a second trough when the fire changed direction.
“He’s a very special man,” his mum said from Concord Hospital yesterday.
“He’s been trying to deal with the extent of his burns [Cameron has undergone operations to remove the burned skin followed by further surgery to graft new skin to the back of his legs and knees] and whenever the doctors come in and see him, he just says ‘get in there and look after the old man’. I’m just so proud of him.”
Bernie, who suffered full thickness burns to 80 per cent of his body, has defied the logic of burns specialists simply by surviving.
Against the odds he fights on, vowing to his family he will never give up.
“He said to me the other other day he can’t wait until all four of us [Bernie, Bronwyn, Cameron and Jessica] are home together again,” Bronwyn said.
Despite his progress, Bernie is still listed as critically injured.
Changing his dressings takes four hours each day but he is determined to keep getting better.
He has started “walking” one or two steps – which in reality is leaning heavily on a physio’s frame to try and rehabilitate his body.
“Two days ago he fainted doing it, so they are just taking it slowly again,” Bronwyn said.
“When they did it today, they did it really slowly and they kept taking his blood pressure the whole time. I can see his little feet moving and can see he’s trying so hard.”
Bronwyn said Bernie can’t believe he is still alive after the fire.
“Bernie was in the police force as a highway patrol sergeant and has seen a lot of very traumatic things,” she said.
“He knows more than anyone that 80 per cent [burns] is touch and go. We know Bernie is not out of the woods yet but I really think he’s going to give them a run for their money.”