Wallingford Boy, 4, Seriously Injured In 15-Foot Fall; Community Rallies

WALLINGFORD, CT — The community is rallying around a 4-year-old boy who was seriously injured after falling 15 feet onto concrete and faces surgery and a long road to recovery, according to a GoFundMe campaign.

The GoFundMe campaign has been launched to help the family with medical expenses for what is expected to be a lengthy hospital stay.

Kayla Horkavy, whose son was injured in the fall, wrote in the GoFundMe post that while it’s difficult for her to ever ask for help, her “whole being and my whole world is my boys.”

“I would do anything for them,” she wrote in the post. “So I’m putting my feelings aside and asking for help, please.

“Long, terrifying story short. Our sweet, wild boy Dean had a terrible fall from 15 feet onto concrete. He is currently in the pediatric icu and will have surgery and a long recovery ahead of him. He suffered skull and orbital fractures that even the doctors said were complex and they’d never seen before. He also suffered injuries to his shoulder, ribs and lung but those are minor compared to his head and shouldn’t require any surgery.”

Horkavy said Dean was initially hooked up to a ventilator and placed in a medically induced coma, “for his own healing and safety.” He was taken off the ventilator and was awake and trying to talk on Monday, according to an update on the GoFundMe page.

Dean had been scheduled for surgery on Wednesday, but Horkavy wrote that his respiratory was “too unstable for surgery.”

“We will try to get his oxygen levels up and then revisit surgery in the next couple days/early next week,” she wrote in the update. “He’s hanging in there and eating a little bit.”

After surgery, it is expected to take “3-6 months for him to heal and we will need to be super careful as to not re-injure,” according to Horkavy.

“A lot is up in the air now,” Horkavy wrote in the post. “I believe we will be here for a while still but all that matters is that he’s okay and there appears to be no deficits. For now we just wait and pray there are no complications and no deficits after surgery.”

More than $4,500 has been raised within the first two days of the GoFundMe campaign, as of Tuesday evening. (Update: More than $9,200 has been raised as of Friday night)

For more information, or to make a donation, visit the GoFundMe page here.