RICHFIELD: When he woke up, Revere junior Caleb Perkins felt dizzy and disoriented.
He found his body hooked up to machines and realized he was in some sort of an emergency room. Following doctors’ instructions, Caleb’s parents, Lara and Ronny, told their son he took a fall at track practice.
But when doctors let Caleb use his cellphone again, he started to piece together what had actually happened.
As Caleb completed his fourth event during a track practice on March 18, his body wavered and he went into cardiac arrest. He was later put into an induced coma for a few days and moved to the Cleveland Clinic for 19 grueling days of tests.
“They gave me my phone back probably earlier than they should have,” Caleb said in a phone interview Sunday. “Obviously my phone blew up with stuff, and I was tagged on Twitter with the news report that said what had happened. I looked at my parents and said, ‘Oh, so it’s a little more than I just passed out at track.’ ”
An automated external defibrillator and CPR, Caleb also found out, saved his life. That’s why he and his family have all become activists for proper training and funding for AEDs and CPR.
The Perkins family, along with Revere coaches, athletic trainers and Terry Gordon, a retired Akron General doctor impersonating the Bee Gees’ Barry Gibb, spoke at an event Monday at Revere High School. The event, nicknamed “Caleb Perkins Revived,” primarily featured a session during which approximately 100 people in attendance learned how to perform CPR.
“It’s so important to have AED and CPR training because it is literally what saved [Caleb’s] life,” Lara said. “That’s kind of our new mission in life — to get up in front of as many people as we need to so other parents have the same chance that we had to have our child live through something like this. Everybody was trained and they were there at the right time.”
Gordon talked about how to learn CPR by compressing a chest to the beat of the song Staying Alive. He tasked the entire crowd with standing on the gymnasium floor and had them practice CPR on dummies sprawled across the room. Audience members listened to instructions delivered on a video from the American Heart Association before getting to work. There were also tables set up promoting AED usage and awareness.
Caleb, wearing his number 25 Revere jersey, joined the crowd and practiced, too.
“I’m a survivor, and I know my name’s on all this stuff, but it’s not about me,” Caleb said. “It’s about spreading awareness.”
In the three weeks Caleb spent in the hospital, absolute chaos ensued for Lara and Ronny, but somewhere in a frenzy of meeting doctors and nurses, they were told assistant track coach Brian Racin started CPR, head coach Lyle Kniep called 9-1-1 and athletic trainers eventually decided to use an AED.
What no one could tell Lara and Ronny, however, is exactly why their son had suffered a cardiac arrest.
“Honestly, they don’t know for sure [what happened],” Lara said Sunday. “Sometimes there’s no answer as to why this happens.”
At one point, doctors talked about a heart transplant and referenced potential scarring on his heart. In the end, they implemented an implantable cardioverter-defibrillator and diagnosed Caleb with cardiomyopathy.
“It’ll probably never happen again, but if it did, he was going to have to have this personal AED as a backup,” Lara said. “We’re in the healing process as of right now.”
As Caleb is a self-described workout junkie, not being able to hit the gym has been hard, as was watching two of his former relay teams break school records.
Still, Caleb said his life is starting to feel normal again. He recently celebrated his 17th birthday, capped with a Chipotle dinner — “I’m never taking that for granted again,” Caleb said — and he remains involved in a Wednesday night service at his church. Lara said her son will play sports again, too, even if the games are different and his role has changed. His intention to play football in the fall remains strong.
“He’s played sports literally his whole entire life, so this has been a tough pill to swallow, having to slow down,” Lara said. “This kid has been an athlete his whole life and I know he went through something major, but after all these tests and surpassing them [we know] he’s young and healthy.
“I have no doubt Caleb will be playing sports again. It might be in a different capacity, but it’s all he knows and what we loves, and as long as he’s not putting his life on the line, we’re going to support him 100 percent.”
Through an emotional thank you message to the crowd Monday, Caleb’s parents talked about what got them through this process.
“When a community comes together for a cause like this, it’s amazing to see,” Ronny said. “All the arms opened up, and we’re forever grateful for everything that you’ve done for us.”
Read the high school blog at http://www.ohio.com/preps.