September 23, 2025 • 24 mins
In this episode of Unwritten, Trevor Barreca sits down with Caitlyn Robinson to talk about how God intervened in her family's most earthshattering tragedy, transforming their despair into a profound witness of miraculous healing and faith.
Whether you're a parent facing unimaginable difficulty, someone wrestling with the power of prayer, or just curious about how divine grace and the communion of saints can move mountains, this conversation will inspire you to believe in the impossible and recognize God's active presence in our darkest hours.
What You’ll Hear:
- Caitlyn, a mother of nine, recounts the terrifying Sunday morning when her young son, Vincent, was found lifeless after drowning in their backyard hot tub, and the immediate, frantic attempts at CPR.
- The initial despair as Vincent showed no signs of life, the family's fervent prayers and Hail Marys, and the powerful, immediate prayer chain that ignited through their community, parish, and beyond.
- The hospital's grim prognosis after Vincent received 52 minutes of CPR with no pulse, Caitlyn's initial skepticism about a full recovery, and her profound realization of the intercessory power of the communion of saints.
- The pivotal role of the Novena to Blessed Michael McGivney, the placement of a relic on Vincent's chest during a hospital Mass, and how this led to his miraculous, complete recovery, including an organ-clear MRI and Vincent walking out of the hospital on the ninth day of the novena, perfectly fine.
Hit follow or subscribe so you don’t miss future episodes!
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Hang Out With Us at SEEK26: http://bit.ly/3IPoew4
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:05):
Welcome to Unwritten, a podcast dedicated to sharing stories,
the movement of the Holy Spirit in the world.
Today, I'm your host, Trevor Bereka, and on today's episode,
we're getting to hear from Caitlin Robinson.
We're releasing new episodes of God's work in the world every
Tuesday. So if you haven't yet, I'd love
to invite you to subscribe to the show wherever you're
listening so you can stay connected to these powerful
stories as the show continues togrow.
(00:29):
I vividly remember the feeling just 4 1/2 years ago of leaving
the hospital when my oldest was born and having a growing
realization, kind of a almost a visual reaction to the reality
that my life was never going to be the same.
I knew that from that point on, no matter what was going on in
Evie's life, she was completely dependent on my wife and I for
every single need and intervention necessary for her
(00:50):
well-being. And while that's true, it's also
the case that the support that we received, and I believe many
can receive, everyone can receive from their community,
both earthly and heavenly. And caring for your child.
It might very well be the thing that one day you can't get on
without. In today's episode, Caitlin and
Wes experienced one of the most earth shattering tragedies of
(01:11):
parents life and encounter the grace of the community of Saints
and their community and their hardest hour.
Welcome to the show and listen in.
All right, so my name is CaitlinRobinson.
I am mother to 9 children. Now, at the time of the
(01:32):
accident, we were pregnant. I was pregnant, 30 weeks
pregnant with our ninth child, Perpetua, who was born in May.
But what happened was it was a Sunday morning.
We had gone to Mass like we usually do, and we'd gone to
breakfast or we've gone to get bagels after and then gone home,
made breakfast and had plans later that afternoon to go out
(01:56):
to a restaurant in The Cave Creek area with both my parents
and Wes's parents. Wes is my husband.
And when we had finished breakfast, I'd gone back inside
to help to kind of clean the kitchen, bake bread for dinner
later that night. And the kids were all outside
(02:19):
with my husband doing gardening,planting new starters and just
kind of, you know, a nice Sundaymorning.
I had put bread in the oven around 11:00.
And had it occurred to me that Ishould try to lay lay our
youngest son, Vincent, He that he's our eighth child.
(02:40):
He was 14 months old at the timethat I should lay him down for a
nap before we went out to that restaurant.
And so I popped my head out in the backyard and asked my
husband where Vincent was because I wanted to lay him down
for a nap. And he said, oh, he's not out
here. He's inside with you.
And I said, oh, no, he's not. I definitely left him outside
(03:00):
after we ate breakfast, So he's out here.
And so everybody started looking.
And normally I stay very calm when we're looking for a kid.
So I ran around to the side of the yard and the gate was open.
I assumed maybe he had gotten out the side gate.
They had been going in and out of the garage planting seeds,
you know, so who knows? So I ran out the street calling
(03:21):
for Vincent. We couldn't find him.
And we're we live in the back ofour house is a busy street.
So all of a sudden I'm thinking,Oh my gosh, he ran out to the he
ran out to the Main St. And you know, at this point, all
my kids were kind of alarmed andthey were all kind of running
around looking for him, saying his name.
And I ran out to the street, couldn't find him, went back
(03:43):
inside and was just looking in closets behind doors.
Because sometimes kids when they're tired, they just kind of
curl up and fall asleep somewhere.
And I couldn't find him. And then I heard my husband call
from outside, scream from outside that to come out.
And when I ran outside, he was holding Vincent.
(04:06):
He had pulled him out of the bottom of the hot tub in our
backyard. He was totally lifeless.
He had white foam on his face, I'm assuming from the bottle he
had had earlier that day. I ran inside and I grabbed the
phone and I dialed 911 and I screamed into the phone that my
baby had drowned. Please help.
(04:30):
And she asked for our address. I gave her her address, and she
asked me to start CPR right away.
So I gave the phone to Wes and Iran to the front yard while Wes
started CPR. And Vincent, during the course
of this, though, you know, our oldest son is 12 years old,
Francis. He must have gone inside and
(04:51):
grabbed our crucifix that we've received for our wedding day and
put it right next to Vincent's body while Wes did CPR, which I
didn't realize until afterwards when I saw the crucifix out of
place that he had done that. But anyways, I ran out to the
front. The kids all followed me, just
waiting for the first responder to come.
In the meantime, we had just been screaming Hail Marys and
(05:13):
into the sky begging for somebody to show up.
The fire department showed up and before I knew it, he was
just gone. Like he was gone.
He was, he was gone. He, he, he had no movement at
all. He wasn't responding to the CPR,
nothing. So they told us to go inside.
(05:34):
Somebody told me to go inside. We sent the kids upstairs with
our tray of rosaries and I just told them to just start praying
rosaries for Vincent. And Wes, in the meantime, called
both of our sets of parents because they were supposed to be
meeting us out at the restaurant.
And he called my brother, FatherDan, and told, he told all of
(05:59):
them that Vincent had drowned. And when people hear that
somebody had drowned, it seems so final.
It seems like he was dead and tous, to me, Vincent was dead.
I saw him. I saw that he was just gone.
People started showing up. The trauma response team from
the fire department came in and started asking questions.
(06:20):
You know, all of our kids names and ages and what happened.
And I was just hysterical. I was screaming and crying and
the kids saw all of this. After probably 1/2 an hour, my
parents showed up. Wes's parents showed up.
Father Dan was on his way down from Flagstaff, where he's a
(06:40):
parish priest. They told us we should go to the
well, originally they told us just to stay at the house, that
we'd get news quicker. And you know, we're assuming
news that he had passed. And then what did the next steps
were about 1/2 an hour later, they told us we should go to the
hospital. There was already already a news
crew there and took us to the hospital and put us into a
(07:05):
waiting room where they would update us as soon as they had
anything. And at that point, we, we knew
nothing. I remember telling my husband
that we we couldn't let this destroy our family and that we
needed to be strong for the kidsand for each other and that it
wasn't was his fault. And accidents happen.
Our pool was fenced. You know, I've taught all of
(07:28):
them, my kids, the six oldest kids, how to swim.
I was a competitive swimmer growing up.
I taught swim lessons. I know the dangers of pool and I
know about pool safety, but accidents still just happen.
And so we were in the waiting room and finally the trauma
response team came in and she said to us, Vincent's alive.
(07:49):
And Wes's response was, no, he'snot.
And the woman said that would becruel to to say that he was
alive if he wasn't. So he was still alive
immediately. Wes said, I need to see him now.
Can we please see him now? And she said, well, I don't
know. They're still working on him.
I'll go check. And he just insisted that we
(08:11):
needed to see him right away. And from that moment, that
moment of this like glimmer of hope that Wes had was what we're
going to pray. And we're going to do whatever
we can to to to save Vincent. I felt hopeless.
I had seen him, I thought, I thought if he survived this, he
would have all sorts of organ damage, physical damage done to
(08:32):
his body. He would never be the same kid
again. And he was always such a joyful
kid. He was born on Christmas Day in
2023. He was so sweet.
The kids just loved him so much.And I was already using past
tense at this point that he was so loved.
He was so loved. And so about 15 minutes later,
they let us in to see Vincent and he was sideways on the bed.
(08:52):
He had tubes coming and going out of both legs down his
jugular. He was swollen and he was so
still and they had put him into a cold plate to cool his body.
Because the 1st 72 hours after drowning, your brain continues
to swell. And so to prevent the swelling
(09:14):
and further damage, they cool the body.
And so he was, he was laying there sideways and when we
walked to the room, I just fell to the ground.
I couldn't walk in when I saw him and my heart just broke.
And they had to get a wheelchairand they wheeled me to him and
they told me to kiss him. The trauma response woman, she
(09:38):
was so sweet and so kind. And I'm so glad they said that
because I couldn't even look at him.
He just, it wasn't him. He was, he was lifeless.
He was gone. I kissed him.
And then they took us out because they needed to working
on him. At some point, our parish priest
had arrived because we called him because my brother was stuck
in traffic coming down from Flagstaff.
(10:00):
And so Father Cruz was able to be with us.
And then Father Dan came and we just sat and prayed and
eventually they let us back intothe room where Vincent was being
taken care of. Father Cruz, instead of he had
tried to go back to the rectory and he just told us, he had told
(10:21):
us later that he couldn't. He went, ended up going back to
the church, sending out a flock note to our parish to ask for
prayers and that they were goingto hold a holy hour for Vincent
at 7:00. The flock note must have gone
out at 6:15 and by 7 the entire Chapel was full of parishioners
who had just gathered to pray for us.
(10:42):
And that was sort of the beginning of just this wild,
amazing prayer, people just praying all over for Vincent and
for our family. Wes and I at this point, you
know, we're in the room, we're texting people, asking everybody
for prayers. I had texted my doctor because I
had an appointment the next morning that I wouldn't be
there. And he happens to be a Deacon in
(11:03):
the church. And so he was, he was with a
priest at the time. And so the prayer chains just
started just flying everywhere. People everywhere were praying
for us Sunday night. They told us, you know, the 1st
72 hours are vital. Monday morning, you know, we
woke up and they're still just monitoring him.
They were doing X-rays every dayon his chest to see the because
(11:25):
it's obviously his lungs were filled with fluid.
He was on paralytics so his bodywouldn't move so it could
recover. They also put, I think it's an
EEG around his head to check brain activity, mostly to make
sure that there were no seizuresin his brain and just monitoring
him to see what kind of damage he would sustain.
(11:46):
They told us that Vincent had had 52 minutes of CPR, He had
arrived at the hospital with no pulse.
He had what they call the red pulses, which were just super,
super faint pulses. And then they would kind of come
and then go again. And so after 52 minutes, they
were able to resuscitate him in the emergency department.
(12:08):
But anybody who has been withoutoxygen for 52 minutes, the
prognosis is not good. After 30 minutes, you're likely
to suffer brain damage. And so they just didn't know
what was going to happen. At this point.
We just had no idea if he was going to wake up.
When he woke up, then we'd be able to tell how much what the
(12:31):
future would look like for for us and for him.
And so we pray to Rosary Divine Mercy Chaplet at the end of
every rosary. So all of our children we've
named after Saints and so we started to add at the end of our
rosary, St. Francis, pray for us, Saint
Genevieve, pray for us, Saint Clair, St.
(12:52):
Faustina, St. Lucia, St.
Sebastian, Veronica Vincent. And then and just that was how
we finished our rosary. And then as feast days occurred
through the week, we added whoever Saints feast day it was
on Monday, we found out that it was a Mexican laywoman who was
now blessed. Her name is Blessed Conchita,
(13:14):
and she was a mother of nine kids, and one of her sons had
drowned. I think he was three years old.
And so we were praying to Blessed Conchita the first
night. We were praying to the Alma
family, to Cardinal Pell, anybody we could think of.
Because when you are in the throes of it, you will pray to
everybody who is listening. And, you know, as Catholics, we
(13:37):
believe that the Saints in heaven are closer to Christ and
will intercede on our behalf forthings that we need.
And so the communion of Saints were so present in our room for
those days as we just added moreand more Saints to the litany,
we were allowed to have as many people come to the hospital and
pray with us as we wanted. So the first night, his God, his
(14:00):
God parents, Jake and Christina,had come.
And Christina's brother is a priest with the Dominicans, and
he's based in Connecticut. And he, he also knows my brother
and Father Dan. And so he might have been at
this point that we were presented the possibility of
getting a relic of Father Michael, blessed Father Michael
(14:22):
Mcgivney, who was the founder ofthe Knights of Columbus.
And of course, we're going to say yes to any relics that we
could get. I didn't know much about Father
Michael at the time, but we saidyes.
And that was, yeah, it must havebeen Monday or Tuesday.
So by Tuesday we had no information on how Vincent was
doing. Wednesday was Ash Wednesday, So
(14:45):
Father Dan had offered to come and say Mass at the hospital
with us, and he had also received the relic of Father
Mcgimney. So Father Dan brought the relic
and said Mass. And during Mass, he, after the
consecration, he held the body of Christ to Vincent's head.
(15:06):
And we had laid the relic on Vincent's chest during Mass.
And you know, we began the novena that day and then, you
know, just waited because it's Wednesday was 72 hours, so we
would have more information. He was scheduled to have an MRI
(15:26):
the following day, Thursday, to show how much damage was done to
his organs, his heart, his, you know, bowels, everything.
Wednesday was day one of the novena.
And the kids have come to see Vincent.
And they told me that Vincent had moved his foot.
I was like, well, it was probably just a spasm.
You guys. Like, you know, I'm trying to be
(15:47):
realistic. In my mind, Vincent would never
be the same. I had prayed that if the Lord
was going to take Vincent to take him quickly because it was
just too hard to suffer. It was just too hard to see him
suffer. But the kids, of course, you
know, said mom, his foot moved. He's excited to see us.
And I said, OK, guys, we just wedon't know what that is.
(16:09):
And then later that evening, we had friends over, about 5 people
in the room. We pray the rosary.
We held the relic to Father Mcgimney and and we'd also
received other relics from friends.
One was a Saint Maria Goretti relic.
You know, we just did everything.
And that evening we were informed that we would have to,
(16:30):
going forward, limit the amount of guests that we had in the
room. Up until this point, we were
allowed to have as many guests as we wanted pretty much
whenever we wanted, even though it was flu season.
Because when somebody's in end of life care, they're less
concerned about germs, obviously, and anything else
(16:50):
that the most important thing isjust to, you know, have some
support for the family. But Wednesday night, they told
us he was no longer in end of life care and that he was
entering recovery. And when I heard this, I said to
myself, well, we don't know whatrecovery is going to look like.
(17:12):
I mean, this is the very realistic part of myself was
that he still wasn't going to bethe same like recovery, OK,
sure. They're going to save recovery.
They're trying to give us hope. Whatever.
We still have the MRI tomorrow. We have no idea what that's
going to look like. Oh, and also when we, when we
started the Novina, I should saythere's a portion at the end
(17:33):
where you are asked to insert your intention.
And you know, I am a cradle Catholic, lifelong Catholic.
I believe in miracles, the miracles that happen in the
Bible, you know, total and complete healing of this and
that of hemorrhaging and blindness and crippleness and
all of these things. I, you know, but there was
always a part of me that said, well, you know, was she really
(17:55):
hemorrhaging for 12 years? Or, you know, was it was the
blind man really that blind whenGod or when Christ restored his
sight? And we're told, you know, also
that we don't ask enough in prayer.
I had brought to the hospital this book Trustful Surrender to
Divine Providence. And there's a chapter in it that
(18:17):
says that we don't ask enough inprayer of God.
God wants us to ask a lot. So when we started the novena
and the intention, I and I said for the complete and total
healing of Vincent Martin Robinson.
So even when they said recovery,I was skeptical though.
And the next morning was the MRI.
And later that afternoon, the results came back that all of
(18:41):
his organs were free of damage. They were coming back all clear.
But again, you know, they, they,they said, but we don't know
what it's going to look like if and when he wakes up.
But he has no damage to his organs.
And that was pretty shocking to us.
And I remember asking the doctor, well, will he need
another MRI? Like, how?
(19:04):
How do you know? Like, is damage going to occur?
What does this mean? And they said, well, no,
everything's his organs are fine.
And so praise God. But again, I was just thinking
he was still comatose. We still did not know what he
was going to look like if and when he woke up.
So that was the second day of the novena.
(19:25):
On that Friday, the 3rd day of the novena, they told us they
were going to try to lower his, take him off the fentanyl and
take him off as many drugs as they could and extubate him.
And they warned us that with extubation, they try to get it
out as quickly as they can, but there's always a chance that it
will have to go back in because he won't be able to breathe on
(19:46):
his own. And so they excavated him and
the two never had to go back in.They put him on like AC pap for
breathing, but that was it. And so they took him off the
fentanyl that day and switched him over to methadone.
Wes stayed with him in the hospital that night and watched
over him as he went through the withdrawals.
(20:08):
And by the next morning he his eyes were clear and he was sort
of awake, and he looked the mostnormal.
That we'd seen him since the accident.
They their goal was to get the feeding tube out and take off
the C pap for the day that wouldhave been the 4th day of the
novena and they removed the C pap and the feeding tube and the
(20:32):
feeding tube never went back in.Sunday was day five of the
novena to Father Mcgivney. The kids were able to come to
the hospital. He was able to go outside and he
was standing and trying to pick stuff up, and they asked us what
he would eat. You know, did he want a popsicle
(20:53):
or did he want to try like, a Graham cracker?
And he doesn't really eat that stuff at home very often.
But Wes had pulled out his breakfast, which was Greek
yogurt and protein powder mixed together.
He saw it and that's all he wanted to eat was the yogurt.
And so that was the fifth day ofthe novena.
(21:14):
I think it was about this time that I realized that we were
going to be leaving the hospitalon the 9th day of the novena.
I just, I just knew it. And the doctors said it was
remarkable how quickly he was improving.
The Doctor Who had received him the previous Sunday was back
that next Sunday when Vincent was eating and he stopped by to
(21:36):
see how Vincent was doing and hejust was in awe that that
Vincent was able to clench his fists and pick things up and
hand him this toy fire engine. It was pretty awesome.
Day seven of the novena he was moved out of the pediatric
intensive care unit and they didthe last X-ray of his lungs to
(21:56):
see how they were looking and his lungs were completely
cleared of fluid. Wednesday was the 8th day and he
they had been evaluating him forphysical therapy, occupational
therapy and speech therapy whichare all you know, normal things
to see. And for speech therapy they had
to do a swallow study where theywatch him.
(22:17):
I think it's via like X-ray whenhe took three bites of food and
they were done and said Yep everything looks good he's all
cleared. He had also passed all of his
physical therapy, occupational therapy, they couldn't imagine
him needing anything outside of the hospital, which was just
incredible. And on the 9th day of the
(22:38):
novena, Vincent was released from the hospital and he walked
out and we went straight to our parish, to the Adoration Chapel
and just prayers of Thanksgivingfor this miracle that had
happened to us and for all the people that had been praying for
us all along. We had heard prayer intentions
on the Divine Mercy Chaplain, onRelevant Radio, on the family
(23:01):
rosary across America, just so many people all over the world
praying for our sweet little baby and for our family.
And here he was perfectly fine. And he is still perfectly fine.
Thank you so much, Caitlin, for giving witness today to what God
did in your family to restore Vincent's health and your
(23:22):
family's hope. Can you believe this?
I think what was just so gripping to me is just how wide,
how powerful the chain God of people who are praying and
asking and pleading the Lord fora miracle for this family and
this little boy. How beautiful it is to see so
many people who came alongside them in their darkest hour.
And 1 of the hardest moments that I can imagine for a
(23:45):
family's life. When we started the show, it was
with a conviction that God is still at work in the world, that
the Holy Spirit still continue to bring about acts of grace in
the world to give witness to Hispower.
As I was listening today, I was just struck by how this story
just shows that so wonderfully and beautifully that I think
it's so moving for anyone who could listen.
(24:06):
And I'd like to invite you to share the story with someone
today who you think maybe it's forgotten that God loves them,
that God wants to work in their life for the good.
And that the next time you or I get a prayer request from
someone, can we all just give a little bit more commitment to
our prayers for that person, knowing that God truly does hear
the cry of our hearts? Thanks so much for listening
this week. We hope to see you next week.
Welcome to Unwritten, a podcast dedicated to sharing stories,
the movement of the Holy Spirit in the world.
Today, I'm your host, Trevor Bereka, and on today's episode,
we're getting to hear from Caitlin Robinson.
We're releasing new episodes of God's work in the world every
Tuesday. So if you haven't yet, I'd love
to invite you to subscribe to the show wherever you're
listening so you can stay connected to these powerful
stories as the show continues togrow.
(00:29):
I vividly remember the feeling just 4 1/2 years ago of leaving
the hospital when my oldest was born and having a growing
realization, kind of a almost a visual reaction to the reality
that my life was never going to be the same.
I knew that from that point on, no matter what was going on in
Evie's life, she was completely dependent on my wife and I for
every single need and intervention necessary for her
(00:50):
well-being. And while that's true, it's also
the case that the support that we received, and I believe many
can receive, everyone can receive from their community,
both earthly and heavenly. And caring for your child.
It might very well be the thing that one day you can't get on
without. In today's episode, Caitlin and
Wes experienced one of the most earth shattering tragedies of
(01:11):
parents life and encounter the grace of the community of Saints
and their community and their hardest hour.
Welcome to the show and listen in.
All right, so my name is CaitlinRobinson.
I am mother to 9 children. Now, at the time of the
(01:32):
accident, we were pregnant. I was pregnant, 30 weeks
pregnant with our ninth child, Perpetua, who was born in May.
But what happened was it was a Sunday morning.
We had gone to Mass like we usually do, and we'd gone to
breakfast or we've gone to get bagels after and then gone home,
made breakfast and had plans later that afternoon to go out
(01:56):
to a restaurant in The Cave Creek area with both my parents
and Wes's parents. Wes is my husband.
And when we had finished breakfast, I'd gone back inside
to help to kind of clean the kitchen, bake bread for dinner
later that night. And the kids were all outside
(02:19):
with my husband doing gardening,planting new starters and just
kind of, you know, a nice Sundaymorning.
I had put bread in the oven around 11:00.
And had it occurred to me that Ishould try to lay lay our
youngest son, Vincent, He that he's our eighth child.
(02:40):
He was 14 months old at the timethat I should lay him down for a
nap before we went out to that restaurant.
And so I popped my head out in the backyard and asked my
husband where Vincent was because I wanted to lay him down
for a nap. And he said, oh, he's not out
here. He's inside with you.
And I said, oh, no, he's not. I definitely left him outside
(03:00):
after we ate breakfast, So he's out here.
And so everybody started looking.
And normally I stay very calm when we're looking for a kid.
So I ran around to the side of the yard and the gate was open.
I assumed maybe he had gotten out the side gate.
They had been going in and out of the garage planting seeds,
you know, so who knows? So I ran out the street calling
(03:21):
for Vincent. We couldn't find him.
And we're we live in the back ofour house is a busy street.
So all of a sudden I'm thinking,Oh my gosh, he ran out to the he
ran out to the Main St. And you know, at this point, all
my kids were kind of alarmed andthey were all kind of running
around looking for him, saying his name.
And I ran out to the street, couldn't find him, went back
(03:43):
inside and was just looking in closets behind doors.
Because sometimes kids when they're tired, they just kind of
curl up and fall asleep somewhere.
And I couldn't find him. And then I heard my husband call
from outside, scream from outside that to come out.
And when I ran outside, he was holding Vincent.
(04:06):
He had pulled him out of the bottom of the hot tub in our
backyard. He was totally lifeless.
He had white foam on his face, I'm assuming from the bottle he
had had earlier that day. I ran inside and I grabbed the
phone and I dialed 911 and I screamed into the phone that my
baby had drowned. Please help.
(04:30):
And she asked for our address. I gave her her address, and she
asked me to start CPR right away.
So I gave the phone to Wes and Iran to the front yard while Wes
started CPR. And Vincent, during the course
of this, though, you know, our oldest son is 12 years old,
Francis. He must have gone inside and
(04:51):
grabbed our crucifix that we've received for our wedding day and
put it right next to Vincent's body while Wes did CPR, which I
didn't realize until afterwards when I saw the crucifix out of
place that he had done that. But anyways, I ran out to the
front. The kids all followed me, just
waiting for the first responder to come.
In the meantime, we had just been screaming Hail Marys and
(05:13):
into the sky begging for somebody to show up.
The fire department showed up and before I knew it, he was
just gone. Like he was gone.
He was, he was gone. He, he, he had no movement at
all. He wasn't responding to the CPR,
nothing. So they told us to go inside.
(05:34):
Somebody told me to go inside. We sent the kids upstairs with
our tray of rosaries and I just told them to just start praying
rosaries for Vincent. And Wes, in the meantime, called
both of our sets of parents because they were supposed to be
meeting us out at the restaurant.
And he called my brother, FatherDan, and told, he told all of
(05:59):
them that Vincent had drowned. And when people hear that
somebody had drowned, it seems so final.
It seems like he was dead and tous, to me, Vincent was dead.
I saw him. I saw that he was just gone.
People started showing up. The trauma response team from
the fire department came in and started asking questions.
(06:20):
You know, all of our kids names and ages and what happened.
And I was just hysterical. I was screaming and crying and
the kids saw all of this. After probably 1/2 an hour, my
parents showed up. Wes's parents showed up.
Father Dan was on his way down from Flagstaff, where he's a
(06:40):
parish priest. They told us we should go to the
well, originally they told us just to stay at the house, that
we'd get news quicker. And you know, we're assuming
news that he had passed. And then what did the next steps
were about 1/2 an hour later, they told us we should go to the
hospital. There was already already a news
crew there and took us to the hospital and put us into a
(07:05):
waiting room where they would update us as soon as they had
anything. And at that point, we, we knew
nothing. I remember telling my husband
that we we couldn't let this destroy our family and that we
needed to be strong for the kidsand for each other and that it
wasn't was his fault. And accidents happen.
Our pool was fenced. You know, I've taught all of
(07:28):
them, my kids, the six oldest kids, how to swim.
I was a competitive swimmer growing up.
I taught swim lessons. I know the dangers of pool and I
know about pool safety, but accidents still just happen.
And so we were in the waiting room and finally the trauma
response team came in and she said to us, Vincent's alive.
(07:49):
And Wes's response was, no, he'snot.
And the woman said that would becruel to to say that he was
alive if he wasn't. So he was still alive
immediately. Wes said, I need to see him now.
Can we please see him now? And she said, well, I don't
know. They're still working on him.
I'll go check. And he just insisted that we
(08:11):
needed to see him right away. And from that moment, that
moment of this like glimmer of hope that Wes had was what we're
going to pray. And we're going to do whatever
we can to to to save Vincent. I felt hopeless.
I had seen him, I thought, I thought if he survived this, he
would have all sorts of organ damage, physical damage done to
(08:32):
his body. He would never be the same kid
again. And he was always such a joyful
kid. He was born on Christmas Day in
2023. He was so sweet.
The kids just loved him so much.And I was already using past
tense at this point that he was so loved.
He was so loved. And so about 15 minutes later,
they let us in to see Vincent and he was sideways on the bed.
(08:52):
He had tubes coming and going out of both legs down his
jugular. He was swollen and he was so
still and they had put him into a cold plate to cool his body.
Because the 1st 72 hours after drowning, your brain continues
to swell. And so to prevent the swelling
(09:14):
and further damage, they cool the body.
And so he was, he was laying there sideways and when we
walked to the room, I just fell to the ground.
I couldn't walk in when I saw him and my heart just broke.
And they had to get a wheelchairand they wheeled me to him and
they told me to kiss him. The trauma response woman, she
(09:38):
was so sweet and so kind. And I'm so glad they said that
because I couldn't even look at him.
He just, it wasn't him. He was, he was lifeless.
He was gone. I kissed him.
And then they took us out because they needed to working
on him. At some point, our parish priest
had arrived because we called him because my brother was stuck
in traffic coming down from Flagstaff.
(10:00):
And so Father Cruz was able to be with us.
And then Father Dan came and we just sat and prayed and
eventually they let us back intothe room where Vincent was being
taken care of. Father Cruz, instead of he had
tried to go back to the rectory and he just told us, he had told
(10:21):
us later that he couldn't. He went, ended up going back to
the church, sending out a flock note to our parish to ask for
prayers and that they were goingto hold a holy hour for Vincent
at 7:00. The flock note must have gone
out at 6:15 and by 7 the entire Chapel was full of parishioners
who had just gathered to pray for us.
(10:42):
And that was sort of the beginning of just this wild,
amazing prayer, people just praying all over for Vincent and
for our family. Wes and I at this point, you
know, we're in the room, we're texting people, asking everybody
for prayers. I had texted my doctor because I
had an appointment the next morning that I wouldn't be
there. And he happens to be a Deacon in
(11:03):
the church. And so he was, he was with a
priest at the time. And so the prayer chains just
started just flying everywhere. People everywhere were praying
for us Sunday night. They told us, you know, the 1st
72 hours are vital. Monday morning, you know, we
woke up and they're still just monitoring him.
They were doing X-rays every dayon his chest to see the because
(11:25):
it's obviously his lungs were filled with fluid.
He was on paralytics so his bodywouldn't move so it could
recover. They also put, I think it's an
EEG around his head to check brain activity, mostly to make
sure that there were no seizuresin his brain and just monitoring
him to see what kind of damage he would sustain.
(11:46):
They told us that Vincent had had 52 minutes of CPR, He had
arrived at the hospital with no pulse.
He had what they call the red pulses, which were just super,
super faint pulses. And then they would kind of come
and then go again. And so after 52 minutes, they
were able to resuscitate him in the emergency department.
(12:08):
But anybody who has been withoutoxygen for 52 minutes, the
prognosis is not good. After 30 minutes, you're likely
to suffer brain damage. And so they just didn't know
what was going to happen. At this point.
We just had no idea if he was going to wake up.
When he woke up, then we'd be able to tell how much what the
(12:31):
future would look like for for us and for him.
And so we pray to Rosary Divine Mercy Chaplet at the end of
every rosary. So all of our children we've
named after Saints and so we started to add at the end of our
rosary, St. Francis, pray for us, Saint
Genevieve, pray for us, Saint Clair, St.
(12:52):
Faustina, St. Lucia, St.
Sebastian, Veronica Vincent. And then and just that was how
we finished our rosary. And then as feast days occurred
through the week, we added whoever Saints feast day it was
on Monday, we found out that it was a Mexican laywoman who was
now blessed. Her name is Blessed Conchita,
(13:14):
and she was a mother of nine kids, and one of her sons had
drowned. I think he was three years old.
And so we were praying to Blessed Conchita the first
night. We were praying to the Alma
family, to Cardinal Pell, anybody we could think of.
Because when you are in the throes of it, you will pray to
everybody who is listening. And, you know, as Catholics, we
(13:37):
believe that the Saints in heaven are closer to Christ and
will intercede on our behalf forthings that we need.
And so the communion of Saints were so present in our room for
those days as we just added moreand more Saints to the litany,
we were allowed to have as many people come to the hospital and
pray with us as we wanted. So the first night, his God, his
(14:00):
God parents, Jake and Christina,had come.
And Christina's brother is a priest with the Dominicans, and
he's based in Connecticut. And he, he also knows my brother
and Father Dan. And so he might have been at
this point that we were presented the possibility of
getting a relic of Father Michael, blessed Father Michael
(14:22):
Mcgivney, who was the founder ofthe Knights of Columbus.
And of course, we're going to say yes to any relics that we
could get. I didn't know much about Father
Michael at the time, but we saidyes.
And that was, yeah, it must havebeen Monday or Tuesday.
So by Tuesday we had no information on how Vincent was
doing. Wednesday was Ash Wednesday, So
(14:45):
Father Dan had offered to come and say Mass at the hospital
with us, and he had also received the relic of Father
Mcgimney. So Father Dan brought the relic
and said Mass. And during Mass, he, after the
consecration, he held the body of Christ to Vincent's head.
(15:06):
And we had laid the relic on Vincent's chest during Mass.
And you know, we began the novena that day and then, you
know, just waited because it's Wednesday was 72 hours, so we
would have more information. He was scheduled to have an MRI
(15:26):
the following day, Thursday, to show how much damage was done to
his organs, his heart, his, you know, bowels, everything.
Wednesday was day one of the novena.
And the kids have come to see Vincent.
And they told me that Vincent had moved his foot.
I was like, well, it was probably just a spasm.
You guys. Like, you know, I'm trying to be
(15:47):
realistic. In my mind, Vincent would never
be the same. I had prayed that if the Lord
was going to take Vincent to take him quickly because it was
just too hard to suffer. It was just too hard to see him
suffer. But the kids, of course, you
know, said mom, his foot moved. He's excited to see us.
And I said, OK, guys, we just wedon't know what that is.
(16:09):
And then later that evening, we had friends over, about 5 people
in the room. We pray the rosary.
We held the relic to Father Mcgimney and and we'd also
received other relics from friends.
One was a Saint Maria Goretti relic.
You know, we just did everything.
And that evening we were informed that we would have to,
(16:30):
going forward, limit the amount of guests that we had in the
room. Up until this point, we were
allowed to have as many guests as we wanted pretty much
whenever we wanted, even though it was flu season.
Because when somebody's in end of life care, they're less
concerned about germs, obviously, and anything else
(16:50):
that the most important thing isjust to, you know, have some
support for the family. But Wednesday night, they told
us he was no longer in end of life care and that he was
entering recovery. And when I heard this, I said to
myself, well, we don't know whatrecovery is going to look like.
(17:12):
I mean, this is the very realistic part of myself was
that he still wasn't going to bethe same like recovery, OK,
sure. They're going to save recovery.
They're trying to give us hope. Whatever.
We still have the MRI tomorrow. We have no idea what that's
going to look like. Oh, and also when we, when we
started the Novina, I should saythere's a portion at the end
(17:33):
where you are asked to insert your intention.
And you know, I am a cradle Catholic, lifelong Catholic.
I believe in miracles, the miracles that happen in the
Bible, you know, total and complete healing of this and
that of hemorrhaging and blindness and crippleness and
all of these things. I, you know, but there was
always a part of me that said, well, you know, was she really
(17:55):
hemorrhaging for 12 years? Or, you know, was it was the
blind man really that blind whenGod or when Christ restored his
sight? And we're told, you know, also
that we don't ask enough in prayer.
I had brought to the hospital this book Trustful Surrender to
Divine Providence. And there's a chapter in it that
(18:17):
says that we don't ask enough inprayer of God.
God wants us to ask a lot. So when we started the novena
and the intention, I and I said for the complete and total
healing of Vincent Martin Robinson.
So even when they said recovery,I was skeptical though.
And the next morning was the MRI.
And later that afternoon, the results came back that all of
(18:41):
his organs were free of damage. They were coming back all clear.
But again, you know, they, they,they said, but we don't know
what it's going to look like if and when he wakes up.
But he has no damage to his organs.
And that was pretty shocking to us.
And I remember asking the doctor, well, will he need
another MRI? Like, how?
(19:04):
How do you know? Like, is damage going to occur?
What does this mean? And they said, well, no,
everything's his organs are fine.
And so praise God. But again, I was just thinking
he was still comatose. We still did not know what he
was going to look like if and when he woke up.
So that was the second day of the novena.
(19:25):
On that Friday, the 3rd day of the novena, they told us they
were going to try to lower his, take him off the fentanyl and
take him off as many drugs as they could and extubate him.
And they warned us that with extubation, they try to get it
out as quickly as they can, but there's always a chance that it
will have to go back in because he won't be able to breathe on
(19:46):
his own. And so they excavated him and
the two never had to go back in.They put him on like AC pap for
breathing, but that was it. And so they took him off the
fentanyl that day and switched him over to methadone.
Wes stayed with him in the hospital that night and watched
over him as he went through the withdrawals.
(20:08):
And by the next morning he his eyes were clear and he was sort
of awake, and he looked the mostnormal.
That we'd seen him since the accident.
They their goal was to get the feeding tube out and take off
the C pap for the day that wouldhave been the 4th day of the
novena and they removed the C pap and the feeding tube and the
(20:32):
feeding tube never went back in.Sunday was day five of the
novena to Father Mcgivney. The kids were able to come to
the hospital. He was able to go outside and he
was standing and trying to pick stuff up, and they asked us what
he would eat. You know, did he want a popsicle
(20:53):
or did he want to try like, a Graham cracker?
And he doesn't really eat that stuff at home very often.
But Wes had pulled out his breakfast, which was Greek
yogurt and protein powder mixed together.
He saw it and that's all he wanted to eat was the yogurt.
And so that was the fifth day ofthe novena.
(21:14):
I think it was about this time that I realized that we were
going to be leaving the hospitalon the 9th day of the novena.
I just, I just knew it. And the doctors said it was
remarkable how quickly he was improving.
The Doctor Who had received him the previous Sunday was back
that next Sunday when Vincent was eating and he stopped by to
(21:36):
see how Vincent was doing and hejust was in awe that that
Vincent was able to clench his fists and pick things up and
hand him this toy fire engine. It was pretty awesome.
Day seven of the novena he was moved out of the pediatric
intensive care unit and they didthe last X-ray of his lungs to
(21:56):
see how they were looking and his lungs were completely
cleared of fluid. Wednesday was the 8th day and he
they had been evaluating him forphysical therapy, occupational
therapy and speech therapy whichare all you know, normal things
to see. And for speech therapy they had
to do a swallow study where theywatch him.
(22:17):
I think it's via like X-ray whenhe took three bites of food and
they were done and said Yep everything looks good he's all
cleared. He had also passed all of his
physical therapy, occupational therapy, they couldn't imagine
him needing anything outside of the hospital, which was just
incredible. And on the 9th day of the
(22:38):
novena, Vincent was released from the hospital and he walked
out and we went straight to our parish, to the Adoration Chapel
and just prayers of Thanksgivingfor this miracle that had
happened to us and for all the people that had been praying for
us all along. We had heard prayer intentions
on the Divine Mercy Chaplain, onRelevant Radio, on the family
(23:01):
rosary across America, just so many people all over the world
praying for our sweet little baby and for our family.
And here he was perfectly fine. And he is still perfectly fine.
Thank you so much, Caitlin, for giving witness today to what God
did in your family to restore Vincent's health and your
(23:22):
family's hope. Can you believe this?
I think what was just so gripping to me is just how wide,
how powerful the chain God of people who are praying and
asking and pleading the Lord fora miracle for this family and
this little boy. How beautiful it is to see so
many people who came alongside them in their darkest hour.
And 1 of the hardest moments that I can imagine for a
(23:45):
family's life. When we started the show, it was
with a conviction that God is still at work in the world, that
the Holy Spirit still continue to bring about acts of grace in
the world to give witness to Hispower.
As I was listening today, I was just struck by how this story
just shows that so wonderfully and beautifully that I think
it's so moving for anyone who could listen.
(24:06):
And I'd like to invite you to share the story with someone
today who you think maybe it's forgotten that God loves them,
that God wants to work in their life for the good.
And that the next time you or I get a prayer request from
someone, can we all just give a little bit more commitment to
our prayers for that person, knowing that God truly does hear
the cry of our hearts? Thanks so much for listening
this week. We hope to see you next week.
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark
My Favorite Murder is a true crime comedy podcast hosted by Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark. Each week, Karen and Georgia share compelling true crimes and hometown stories from friends and listeners. Since MFM launched in January of 2016, Karen and Georgia have shared their lifelong interest in true crime and have covered stories of infamous serial killers like the Night Stalker, mysterious cold cases, captivating cults, incredible survivor stories and important events from history like the Tulsa race massacre of 1921. My Favorite Murder is part of the Exactly Right podcast network that provides a platform for bold, creative voices to bring to life provocative, entertaining and relatable stories for audiences everywhere. The Exactly Right roster of podcasts covers a variety of topics including historic true crime, comedic interviews and news, science, pop culture and more. Podcasts on the network include Buried Bones with Kate Winkler Dawson and Paul Holes, That's Messed Up: An SVU Podcast, This Podcast Will Kill You, Bananas and more.