Wounded OIF veteran and wife face a tough decision: Keep $101,000 or share it with a family in need. Their decision will air May 27 on CBS’ 'The Briefcase.'
Set to appear on an undisclosed “family-friendly” reality TV show, David and Cara Bronson were offered a difficult proposition: keep $101,000 or give some or all of that money to a family who may need it even more. David, an Army veteran, lost his left leg due to injuries sustained during Operation Iraqi Freedom. Cara is a nurse. Gavin, 2, and Teagan, a newborn, round out their growing family. On CBS’ The Briefcase, which premieres with the Bronson family’s episode at 8 p.m. EDT on Wednesday, May 27, their decision will be revealed.
The Bronson family recently sat down with The American Legion for a question-and-answer session about their appearance on the upcoming show.
Can you start by talking about your military experience?
David: I joined the military in January 2003. I was deployed to Iraq in support of OIF. We came home, we did train-ups for 2004, then went back to Iraq in January 2005. I got injured Sept. 9, 2005.
As a result, I lost my left leg. I got shot in my right knee, shrapnel up the left side of my body, hearing loss, lung issues, all kinds of stuff that kind of came with that. Then I spent a year-and-a-half at Walter Reed going through recovery and getting out of the military.
What was the transition period at Walter Reed like?
David: I had a head injury. I had shrapnel that hit the left side of my temple under my helmet, it broke the ear cup and I was put into a coma. They had to put in a chest tube, and I was flown to Germany, where they did a couple more surgeries.
I actually coded out once in Iraq and coded out twice in Germany while they were operating on me. Basically I was dead for a short time and then they revived me.
I got to Walter Reed and I was in a coma for a few more days. When I woke up, my whole family was there. There was a struggle for quite a while learning how to walk again. My equilibrium was off - so I would sit up in bed and I would immediately pass out from getting dizzy. I used a walker for quite a while. They actually tried to save my leg. We did a bunch of surgeries, skin grafts, artery transplants, a ton of different things and the blood wasn’t flowing back up the leg properly, it would flow down and it would kind of engorge my foot. My toes would start to bleed from the pressure, so going through months of that, trying to figure out what to do, and the doctor at Walter Reed said my best avenue to regain some use in my leg would be to amputate it below the knee, so we did that.
It took about five or six months to finally learn how to walk. I had a lot of infections in my leg, and I had to go back for surgeries and clean outs.
I still to this day have leg issues. They could pop up tomorrow where I can’t use my prosthetic because I get blood blisters behind my knee, the bone gets sore, I put it on incorrectly and 10 minutes later it can create a lot of issues.
Were you and Cara married at this time? How did you meet?
David: We actually met in 2009 at a friend’s wedding. Then we started dating in 2011 and got married on my Alive Day Anniversary, Sept. 9, 2012.
How did you find yourself in financial hardship?
David: I think it was a lot of everything just trying to support a family and keep everything together. We’ve been trying to save to build a house. My wife doesn’t have a paid maternity leave. I think it’s the normal stuff that most American families go through with debt, where they have student loans, car payments, credit cards, whatever—the monthly bills add up and every month you have to add more and more to it. So it’s hard to really push forward and get ahead.
We’re not poor by any means—we don’t eat Ramen noodles for dinner every night. But I think we’re very similar to most American families.
What kind of financial decisions are you having to make for your family?
David: We’re building a house right now, a VA-adapted home. So down the road, it’s something that we’re going to live in for a long time. The grant is helping offset the purchase price of the home so we can have things like hardwood floors on the first floor so in the future it’s wheelchair accessible - wider hallways, a shower with grab bars and hand sprayers. There’s just a ton of things that go into having an adapted home that the VA requires for the grant. Along with that, buying furniture, stuff for our kids, covering my wife’s maternity leave while she’s out, and then paying down her student loans, credit card, car payments, and all of that.
Throughout the process of the show when we’re presented with $101,000, all of that kind of flashes in front of you, like, “Wow, we could really pay off our debt and kind of start fresh in our new house without any debt other than the mortgage and recurring debt of monthly utilities and everything.” So we thought of all of the pros and cons and whether or not we should help another family or help ourselves a little. A lot of things influenced our final decision as to what we were going to do.
Did the experience on the show teach you anything about your marriage or your family and your all’s values?
Cara: Yeah, it definitely helped Dave and I open up doors of communication - talking about finances. Those are difficult conversations to have. It’s not easy discussing money, and it really brought us closer. It let me see a side of Dave - you know, that I see every day, but he’s really big on helping other people. You don’t realize how sensitive someone is or how giving someone is until you’re presented with this certain situation.
At the end of the day, we just said we’re not going to let this tear us apart and get angry at each other. We have each other at the end of the day and that’s what matters most. Money’s not everything and family’s very important to us.
It was definitely a good experience. I would do it again in a heartbeat.
Does your military background affect how you make these kind of decisions?
David: I definitely think so. I get in more of a strategic mindset, try to think of all options and nothing’s off the table. I think a lot of the things we’re taught in the military resonate into our episode. Helping others is one and also taking care of your family, so that played into it.
You talked about how a lot of the challenges you all are facing financially are ones that many Americans are facing. Do also you think this is an issue for veterans and their families?
David: I think veterans, especially coming home, are finding it hard to find suitable work. I’ve had various jobs since I got out of the military. I had to leave some of them due to medical issues. One I started and two weeks later I had to have surgery and I was out of work for two months. I didn’t have any leave time. . . . Then I had to go six months later for another infection in my leg. It really was difficult for me. I know that a lot of other veterans come back with certain skillsets that you learn in the military that really don’t translate into civilian work. But almost every military servicemember has leadership and other skills that are useful in the work environment.
Without any spoilers, is there anything that surprised you about being on the show?
Cara: The briefcase! (Laughter)
David: Somebody showing up with $101,000 is definitely a big surprise.
I think everybody has a premonition that reality shows aren’t really reality any more, and it’s definitely authentic. There’s no script, there’s nothing fake. I know a lot of our friends have asked us, “Oh, how was it to read a script and all that?” But there was no script, there’s nobody whispering in your ear what to say. It was true emotion, and the rollercoaster that my wife and I went on was 100 percent authentic.
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