For nearly a decade, Tami Gunn has been a fixture at Coleman Care Centre in Barrie. She’s worked as a cook and in laundry, in maintenance and as a basic aide, and she currently supports the team as a housekeeper.
No matter what role she’s in, her love for the residents she supports is at the centre of all she does. She loves to bake and share her treats with the Village, and she’s been known to take extra time after a shift to bake cookies together with residents. These are the moments that fill her spirit, she says.
Tami gives so much to the team at Coleman, so when her life exploded in tragedy in late October of 2024, the Village was instantly ready to give back through the Wilfred Schlegel Hope Fund.
That day was like any other on her rural property in Minesing, northwest of Barrie. It was late October and the crisp coolness of winter was closing in. Tami’s boyfriend Benn was checking the furnace after their large propane tank had been filled and she was on the couch above, contemplating what to make for dinner.
Neither could have known there was a propane leak, until the force of a massive explosion sent shockwaves through their lives.
She was thrown in the air from the force of the blast below. Windows were blown out and the doors sealed shut; she had to bust her way through them to get to the basement to Benn, and he would later say the driving force that got him to his feet was his need to check on her.
He had been directly beside the furnace when the blast occurred and Tami’s voice quivers as she describes what she saw when he emerged.
“It was the worst day of my life,” she says, “but I had to get through because I didn't know if he was alive. As I broke through the door, we were both screaming each other's names trying to get through. He came up the stairs and he was just completely burnt. The skin from his arms was hanging, his face was just black.”
In the blink of an eye, their lives had been transformed.
She called 911 and they waited for emergency crews. She tried to make him comfortable. She called his family and she called her best friend at Coleman, Jamie Dewar, and she struggled with the shock of what was happening.
Benn was eventually transferred to Sunnybrook hospital and Tami went to a friend’s house with nothing but the clothes on her back. She spoke that evening with Coleman’s General Manager, Michelle Uprichard, who told her the Hope Fund was there for her.
“I just want to give my story out because the Hope Fund, if I didn't have that, then I don't know what we would have done,” she says. “I had to be off of work. Benn was off of work. I had bills coming in like no tomorrow and having to go to and from Sunnybrook every day, and then my car broke down . . .”
One moment she was sitting on the couch, contemplating what to make for dinner, and the next she was facing the unknown aftermath of tragedy.
But they are getting through. It’s six months after the accident as she shares her story. Benn is improving every day, stubborn and determined as any farmer not to let something like this knock him down, and they have a new home they’re settling into.
Tami has been back to her work family for four months and she finds comfort in the quaint Village; she’s happy to be back to her routine and back with the residents and team there she holds such love for.
Her gratitude flows as she recounts that terrible period.
“You never know what's going to happen tomorrow,” Tami says. “If I hadn't had the Hope Fund, I don't know what would have happened. It gave me a sense that Coleman and everybody is here for us. I've never been with another company that's had something like this; I never would have thought that I would have had to use it. and I am just happy that I was able to have that to help us.”
“I could breathe a little more and focus on Benn.”
In the breathing room the fund can offer in the wake of tragedy, the first glint of hope is often found.
Click here for more information on the Wilfred Schlegel Hope Fund.
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