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    When the Lights Go Out: A Boy Given a Second Chance
    When the Lights Go Out: A Boy Given a Second Chance
    When the Lights Go Out: A Boy Given a Second Chance
    Ebook129 pages1 hour

    When the Lights Go Out: A Boy Given a Second Chance

    By Ryan Boyle

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    About this ebook

    In October 2003, I became a victim of traumatic brain injury. Thats when I was hit and dragged by a pickup truck while riding a Big Wheel trike at a friends party. Emergency brain surgery saved my life, but I lost a portion of the back part of my brain. At the age of ten, I had to learn how to breathe, swallow, talk, eat, stand, sit, walkeverything all over again.

    Traumatic brain injury is one of the leading causes of disability among children, yet, because of the complexity of the brain, experts still have much to learn about how to treat TBI. In When the Lights Go Out, I describe my therapieswhats worked, what hasnt, and whyand share how I learned to cope with the emotional and psychological challenges. In the process, I have discovered the critical roles that faith in God, love of family, the healing power of friends, and the inherent goodness of people all played in my ability to triumph over overwhelming odds. I have also learned that a horrific accident has given me an amazing gift. When the Lights Go Out is an expression of that gift.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherWestBow Press
    Release dateOct 26, 2012
    ISBN9781449768287
    When the Lights Go Out: A Boy Given a Second Chance
    Author

    Ryan Boyle

    Ryan Boyle was just nine years old when an accident robbed him of a portion of his brain. In When the Lights Go Out, Boyle uses the successes and frustrations of his ongoing recovery to inspire others to never give up. Now eighteen, Ryan is a Paralympic athlete, inspirational speaker, and college student. Meet him on Facebook and at www.ryanboyle.me.

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      Book preview

      When the Lights Go Out - Ryan Boyle

      Copyright © 2012 Ryan Boyle

      All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

      WestBow Press books may be ordered through booksellers or by contacting:

      WestBow Press

      A Division of Thomas Nelson

      1663 Liberty Drive

      Bloomington, IN 47403

      www.westbowpress.com

      1-(866) 928-1240

      Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

      ISBN: 978-1-4497-6829-4 (sc)

      ISBN: 978-1-4497-6830-0 (hc)

      ISBN: 978-1-4497-6828-7 (e)

      Library of Congress Control Number: 2012917598

      WestBow Press rev. date: 10/19/2012

      Contents

      Preface

      Chapter 1 The Day the Lights Went Out

      Chapter 2 Living Nightmare

      Chapter 3 Miracle in Progress

      Chapter 4 Blythedale

      Chapter 5 Christmas Break

      Chapter 6 Making Progress

      Chapter 7 Coming Home

      Chapter 8 School Days

      Chapter 9 Private Therapy

      Chapter 10 Medjugorje

      Chapter 11 Scruffy

      Chapter 12 Moving On

      Epilogue

      About the Author

      To my mom, dad, and my brother, Matt, without whom none of this would have been possible

      Acknowledgements

      I need to thank all the hospitals, doctors, nurses, therapists, and rehab facilities that have aided my recovery, especially Yale New Haven Children’s Hospital, where my numerous life-saving surgeries were performed, and Blythedale Children’s Hospital in Valhalla, New York, where most of my early progression took place.

      Above all, I need to thank my mom, dad, and brother for never losing hope, especially my mom for giving up all the comforts of home to live in the hospital with me for nine months. Without the faith and commitment of you three through every step of the way, my recovery would have been drastically different. I can never thank you three enough for all that you have done for me.

      The kindness and generosity of so many individuals, organizations, and businesses mentioned in this book have made a tremendous impact on my recovery; I would not be doing as well as I am today without your help.

      The prayers of many, including Fr. Skip Karscinski, Mother Teresa’s order the Missionaries of Charity in Bridgeport, William E. Lori, Archbishop of Baltimore, my community, friends, and, above all, my family, which aided my recovery and gave me strength.

      My gratitude for Dr. Joe Zelson can never be fully expressed because he brought together my incredible team of doctors at Yale New Haven Children’s Hospital, which included Dr. Charles Duncan to whom I owe my life.

      Finally, I want to thank my private physical therapist Liz Upton, who was there for my second first steps, always challenged me, and fought for my independence in school.

      This book would have never been possible without the editing of Suzanne Fonda. You turned this book into something it would have never been and you helped make my dream come true.

      Preface

      As the survivor of traumatic brain injury, I wrote this book to give hope to those who may have lost hope, to warn you never to let anyone predict your own future for you, no matter who it is, and to inspire you to never give up. Always make new goals for yourself throughout your life and stop at nothing to achieve them. Above all, never think that there is no one watching over you. I am living proof of the miraculous power of God at work.

      My life forever changed on October 13, 2003…

      Chapter 1

      The Day the Lights Went Out

      Before the day the lights went out, I was a really smart kid. I was also an extremely athletic kid. I loved to run; in fact I got the fastest time in my elementary school for the mile run: 6:31. I was a third grader at the time, and I beat everyone from first through fourth grade. I’d been playing soccer since I was in kindergarten; my favorite story is when I said to my dad before a game that I would score three consecutive goals or a hat trick that day, and I did just that. I also participated in karate and got very good at it until I didn’t feel like having to remember all the different techniques and forms. Most of all, I loved to ride my bike, competitively or just for fun—it didn’t matter as long as I was on it. I mountain biked the most, but I did BMX racing as well. When I was 8 years old, I was so good at mountain biking that I earned the reputation as the #1 mountain bike racer in New England for kids between the ages of 8 and 13. Another pretty cool thing is that when I was BMX racing, I was so good that I achieved the nickname Flyin’ Ryan.

      Ryan%20On%20MT%20bike.JPG

      Me tearin’ it up around our house when I was 8 years old.

      When I went mountain biking it was usually in New Hampshire because there are a ton of really great trails there, hence a lot of races too. We had a cabin up there where we were supposed to go to spend Columbus Day weekend of 2003. Our cabin was on Rocky Bound Pond in Croydon near Lake Sunapee, and I was looking forward to kayaking with my brother, Matt, and riding my mountain bike with him. A lot of my trophies came from winning races in New Hampshire, but adding more trophies to my collection on that particular weekend wasn’t meant to be.

      My Great Aunt Eileen—my dad’s aunt and one of my favorite relatives—had died the week before, and my dad got appendicitis and had to have emergency surgery. That’s how I ended up going to a party at my friend Kenny’s house that would forever change my life.

      It was Kenny’s 10th birthday. To celebrate, he had invited me and some of his other friends to play paintball and have a sleepover at his house. The next morning after breakfast we all went outside to ride his Big Wheel-type toy on the driveway. It was blue and yellow and shaped like a rocket ship with yellow wheels. It had rained during the night, so the pavement on the driveway was wet. We thought it would be fun to use the rocket ship to do doughnuts. In case you don’t know, a doughnut is what you call smoking the tires of a vehicle while driving it in a circle. We knew we couldn’t really smoke the tires of a toy that had no engine or rubber tires, so we tried to make it slide in a circle. This was made easier by the fact that the driveway was covered with wet leaves, which made it difficult for the hard plastic wheels to gain any traction.

      We were all taking turns and having a good time. Then it was my turn; you might say the having a good time part was over. I got in and started to slide the back end out. I forgot to mention that their driveway was on a steep hill. Somehow, I lost control and started sliding backward down the driveway. Once I lost traction, I never regained it. Maybe two cars come down Kenny’s road each day, but that morning a freakin’ Dodge Daytona pickup truck happened to be barreling down it. You guessed it. I slid right into the path of that truck. That’s all I remember. Everything went black.

      Chapter 2

      Living Nightmare

      I can’t tell you what happened because I spent the next two months in a coma. My dad is going to fill you in because talking about it even years later is still too painful for my mom, not that it isn’t for my dad.

      According to the police report, the woman driving the truck was going at least 40 miles per hour in a 20 mile-per-hour speed zone. She hit the brakes and skidded 35 feet before her truck hit Ryan’s head and body at 30 miles per hour. He was wedged under the axle and dragged for 55 feet before the truck came to a stop. Ryan lay lifeless under the pickup truck. The boys playing with Ryan called for help, and Kenny’s father came running. Seeing what had happened, he yelled to his wife to call 911. Then he pulled Ryan from under the truck and laid a blanket on him. When emergency services arrived, Ryan was barely holding onto life. Paramedics put a tube in his throat to help him breathe mechanically and prepared him for the ambulance ride to the hospital.

      It wasn’t until after Ryan was en route to the hospital that we received a call from Kenny’s mother telling us that our son had been in an accident, but was not badly hurt. An ambulance was taking him to St. Vincent Hospital in Bridgeport, which was about 30 minutes from our house in Monroe, Connecticut.

      His mom and I got into the car immediately and raced to St. Vincent’s. We rushed into the emergency department to find that Ryan wasn’t there. He had been sent directly from the scene to Bridgeport Hospital. This was perhaps the first of many miracles to come. One of our close friends happened to be a paramedic at the accident scene. She knew Ryan’s mom, Nancy, would want him to go to Bridgeport Hospital, not St. Vincent’s, because

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