Today Magazine • April 2022

Page 11

GRANBY TODAY

HOMETOWN HERO By Christopher DeFrancesco Special to Today Magazine

This story first appeared in UConn Today, the news website of the University of Connecticut THIS WINTER WAS a new experience for Tim Guilmette. He spent it in his new apartment in Enfield — a significant milestone for a man who’s spent most of his adult life homeless. “This was his first holiday season spent in a home where he was able to decorate and celebrate,” says Jasmine Ortiz-Rivas, whom Guilmette credits with getting him out of the woods and under a roof. “I would not be anywhere without that woman,” he says. “She is my guardian angel. I don’t think I would have lasted another winter.” Guilmette, 64, describes himself as a “survivalist since I was 6 years old.” He got used to fending for himself outdoors at an early age, during a troubled childhood growing up in East Hartland. “When I was a kid, I ran away from home all the time because my father was so abusive,” he says. “I used to spend some of my winter vacations from school out in the woods because I couldn’t stand being around my father.” He spent most of the last four decades “either living in the woods or living in the streets,” Guilmette says, openly admitting

he contributed to his living and health challenges by making poor choices with smoking, drugs and alcohol. It was 2018 and the deterioration of his health was accelerating. GRANBY TODAY His legs became extraordinarily Tim Guilmette swollen, and his breathing became laborious. “I used to be able to deal with the cold, no problem. I used to walk around with a T-shirt in the winter,” Guilmette says. “Cold never bothered me until probably the last couple of years, when my breathing started going bad.” At this point, his home was a makeshift campsite about two miles into the woods in North Granby. “It used to take me 25 to 30 minutes to walk to the campsite, now it would take me close to two and a half hours. I had to do something. It was either get out or die. It was one of the two.” It was 2019 when he was diagnosed with congestive heart failure. He was in the hospital with an exacerbation related to that, and soon after that he became a patient of nurse practitioner Meredith

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Bertrand at UConn Health’s primary care practice in Simsbury. “He was homeless and had not had any health care in several years,” Bertrand recalls from her first encounter with Guilmette. “He was suffering with various medical problems including COPD, heart failure, various arthritic problems, suspected sleep apnea, recurrent cellulitis continued on page 14

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TODAY MAGAZINE – www.TodayPublishing.net – APRIL 2022

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