Friend, volunteers work to refit home for Modesto vet who lost legs

For a man who at various times in the past year wasn’t expected to live, or breathe or eat on his own, or walk again, Modesto resident Bobby Williams is doing three out of four. And he and his wife, Gloria, said they fully expect him to conquer that last hurdle.

The 66-year-old Vietnam veteran, who’s had both legs amputated since October 2014, was in good spirits Friday morning – shaking hands, joking, posing for snapshots – as he watched a longtime friend and about 20 volunteers from Home Depot relandscape his yard and take the first steps in remodeling his home.

“He’s a good guy,” said Mike Gulas, owner of Michael Gulas Construction, who’s known Bobby Williams more than 20 years and has served with him on the cooking crew of the group E Clampus Vitus Estanislao 58 – better known as the Clampers. “And she’s a saint,” he added of Gloria Williams. “She’s been through hell” caring for her husband of five years after he fell ill last fall.

That ordeal began when Gloria took Bobby to the VA hospital in Palo Alto because he was ill. A doctor believed he had pneumonia and wanted to send him home with antibiotics, Gloria said. She protested that her husband was too sick to be sent away.

Bobby was put on an IV and soon sat up, saying he couldn’t breathe and his chest was heavy, Gloria said. The IV had flooded his lungs, and his health rapidly deteriorated, she said. He ended up in a coma and on life support, she said, and came down with a highly contagious, antibiotic-resistant, methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) infection. “We couldn’t even touch him with our bare hands,” Gloria said.

Bobby then came down with a rare blood-clotting disorder. “One doctor said it was a domino effect,” she said. Every time an intravenous line was put in him, he clotted, she said. “When they put a line in the skin on the back of his hand, his fingers started turning gray,” she said. When another line was put in, he got a clot that affected circulation from his groin down, she said. “His left leg was so bad they had to amputate above the knee a few days later,” Gloria said. He’s also lost some fingers.

Her husband developed gangrene on his right foot, too, but because of the severity of his condition – his blood pressure kept falling and he had a fever that got as high as 106 degrees – doctors were reluctant to operate any further, Gloria said.

Several times, she said, she was advised to take Bobby off life support because doctors didn’t believe he’d be able to breathe or eat on his own again. But the former Navy construction battalion member, or Seabee, held on – “I’ve got a lot of things left I want to do,” he said Friday – and recovered enough that doctors could amputate his right leg in March.

Bobby came home in April. Without his legs, daily life has been arduous for the couple. In his wheelchair, Bobby hasn’t been able to get into the bedroom, bathroom or utility porch of their San Juan Drive home. He’s been sleeping on a hospital bed in the living room, and Gloria has given him sponge baths. She moves him from bed to chair using a sling attached to a track system on the ceiling of the room.

The work started by Gulas and the Home Depot volunteers on Friday will widen the doors, turn the bedroom into a fully tiled shower area, or “wet room,” with a track system in the ceiling, and replace all flooring with one hard surface so it flows from room to room. The family room will become a bedroom, Gulas said.

Friday, he oversaw Home Depot volunteers who put in drought-resistant, low-maintenance, drip-irrigated landscaping and did demolition work in the home’s kitchen and bedroom. “They made life a lot easier on me when I come back,” said Gulas, who has been granted $1,600 from the VA to get the remodeling work done within 120 days. “What they did today is that much less we have to do in the future.”

Gulas learned of the Home Depot Foundation volunteer program Team Depot when he was doing a job in Morgan Hill. He mentioned to a Home Depot store manager there that he’d be doing a remodel for a veteran friend. He was urged to ask his local Home Depot store manager about the program.

Team Depot donates labor, materials and tools to community service projects, and “from Sept. 11 to Nov. 11, all of our community projects are to assist veterans through the Celebration of Service program,” said Jimmy Shokraii, Modesto Home Depot manager. He’s the Team Depot captain for his district, which includes 12 stores from Turlock to Sacramento.

“We determine whether the work is within the scope of something we can do,” he said. “We can’t do a roof or highly skilled things, but heavy lifting, and (demolishing) a bedroom and kitchen, and landscaping, we can do. It works out perfectly when we have a guy like Mike to work with.”

As Bobby surveyed the “amazing” work being done on his behalf Friday, he agreed with his wife that things are looking up again. “A couple of months ago, the VA got me a van I can drive,” he said. “And as soon as I get my prosthetics, look out!”

Added Gloria, “They said he won’t be able to walk with the prosthetics. But I said, ‘You didn’t think he’d breathe again.’ ”

Bobby has his sights set even beyond walking. He aims to stand taller than he ever has. Formerly about 5-foot-3, he said he’s talked with doctors about being fitted with legs that would have him more like 6 feet tall.

Gloria’s not so sure about that, but she said he asked doctors, “Can you make me at least 5-4, 5-5?’ The doctors said, ‘I think we can do that.’ ”

This story was originally published November 10, 2015 at 6:31 PM with the headline "Friend, volunteers work to refit home for Modesto vet who lost legs."