Help Jeff Marlin and family

On August 14th, Jeff Marlin was vacationing with his children and friends when he suffered a neck and spinal injury after jumping into the river for a swim. He was taken by life-flight to the wonderful people at BAMC in San Antonio, where he underwent several major surgeries to realign his neck/spine with steel rods and place in a trach to help him breath. While we hold out hope for his recovery to some level of mobility, it will take many months to years for him to try and regain what all he has lost. He currently has no ability to move chest down, and limited hand function. Jeff loved his job rigging heavy items for Transpak Rigging and working in his garage in his free time on creative wood and metal projects...we are praying he can return to both in some form down the road, but are needing help for his current and long term care.

We hope the VA will help take care of some of the medical expenses for this Army veteran, but we are still expecting an overwhelming amount of medical costs already accrued and substantial ones to come. On top of this, he will be unable to work for an unknown amount of time through rehab. This GoFundMe is meant to give the following:

1. Immediate help for his personal financial needs and that of his family's during his long hospital stay in the ICU and beyond; This includes trauma counseling and support for his children and loved ones

2. Assistance with medical costs such as life-flight, ICU, long term stay, rehabilitation and assistive devices (still calculating)

3. Cost of care post-release (TBD)

This account is managed by Jeff's family, and coordinated by his children's aunt - Ashley (Gaudet) Anthony. We will update here on his progress and what your generous funds help to do. For personal information like visitation when it becomes feasible, please reach out to the family contacts you may already have, or his personal cell that is being redirected to his point-of-contact, his children's mother, Amber Gaudet-Marlin. We want to extend a special thank you to Kristin Thompson, the Wilbanks, and the Osburns for their care and friendship during the accident.

Thank you for any support you choose to graciously give.

9/08 update: Jeff is heading to spinal rehab specialist in Houston soon.  We hope to seehim get his trach out and regain hand dexterity.  We also remain hopeful that he can work to regain some movement below his chest, which is currently still paralyzed.  More updates can be seen on his Facebook or via email [email redacted].   Thank you for all your prayers and donations which are already helping!