Caleb Reynolds was medically evacuated from Survivor: Kaoh Rong during Wednesday night's episode due to extreme dehydration and heat exhaustion, but his recovery process took a lot longer than most viewers probably expected.
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Reynolds basically woke up and felt truly alert for the first time when he was riding in an ambulance to the hospital. In that moment, the 28-year-old Army veteran and former Big Brother contestant from Hopkinsville, KY, said he "freaked out."
"I was in the ICU for five-and-half days. The whole time I was in the hospital, I didn't feel like myself. On Day, like 3 or 4, after I had had seven or eight bags of saline pumped into me, I started to feel better. The doctor said my face started to fill back out and my body started to fill back out again, so I started to feel much better on Day 3 or 4 of the process," Reynolds explained.
However, Reynolds' health condition was serious enough that it changed his life in the months following his hospital release. He was faced with many restrictions and required to take it easy when "Beast Mode Cowboy" probably didn't want to.
"It was a good four or five months being back home after all of it that I started feeling okay," Reynolds told Reality TV World. "When I got back home, I continued going to the doctor to make sure that I was okay, and you know, they kept me from going to the gym, they kept me from being out in the heat too much."
So Reynolds concluded, "I would say between five and six months was the full-out recovery to where I felt just amazing again."
Check with Reality TV World later today for more from our interview with Reynolds -- and also look for our additional exclusive interview with his fellow ousted Survivor: Kaoh Rong castaway Alecia Holden.
About The Author: Elizabeth Kwiatkowski