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Wednesday, October 1, 2008
A Mother's Plea
Western Arkansas, AR
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By: Gary Smith
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Photo(s) By: Jennifer Flower
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Springdale's Josh Fisk's Mom Prays 'Take Me, Not Him'
He kept spinning the football, looking for the laces.
That’s one of the things Lisa Fisk remembers about that dreadful day. That, and the fear, panic, dread and the numbing resignation that Josh, her big, strong football playing son, a senior to be and starting center on the Springdale High School football team, had left her house with an “I love you, Mom,” and might not be coming home.
She remembers the doctor crying with her and her husband as he told them Josh had fractured his skull, that his brain had slammed back and then forward against bone and that there really wasn’t much they could do except hope and pray he got better.
She remembers the bargain with God, the “take me, not him” plea on virtually every parent’s lips the moment a child is seriously hurt. She remembers seeing him strapped down on the bed and still fighting the straps, trying to pull out the tubes carrying medicine designed to keep his blood pressure down, keep his insulin regulated, and keep him alive.
She remembers thinking it was a mistake, a bad dream, and then, in the fog of despair, thinking about what she wanted them to dress him in if the worst came to pass.
And she remembers that even in his woozy, injured, virtually comatose state, he kept spinning that football, trying to feel the laces, trying to get ready so he could snap the ball just right, get it to the quarterback just the way he wanted it, do his job just the way he’d been coached to do since, well, since he was old enough to play football.
“It didn’t even have any laces,” Lisa Fisk said. “It was just some toy football they gave him so he’d settle down and not try to pull the tubes out. But he just kept spinning it.”
Lisa and Jim Fisk can almost laugh about parts of it now. About how in a fog, Josh tossed a football to a coach who was leaving the room and hit his girlfriend in the face as she was entering. And they can marvel at the outpouring of love and support from the community and their church and even the booster clubs of both Josh’s Springdale High School and in-town rival Springdale Har-Ber.
“There were a lot of prayers and a lot of support in the school and in the town,” Jim Fisk said. “There was just an outpouring from people.”
The Fisk’s will speak in generalities about the accident that left their son in a hospital, about a confrontation with some other players on May 2 after an off-season workout that resulted in Josh hitting his head on a curb, and about how Josh just wants to get through his senior year without the “drama” he thinks would accompany dwelling on the events.
But most of all, Lisa Fisk remembers how she felt that day.
“I was devastated,” Lisa said, pausing occasionally as the emotions of the events flooded back. “As a parent, when your child is hurt, you start thinking ‘ok, so how are we going to take care of this?’. But with this, I just kept thinking, ‘who can fix this, who can make this better?’”
Apparently, only Josh himself. Fisk was transported to Springdale Memorial Hospital immediately after the accident, and remained there in intensive care for seven days until doctors decided his condition warranted being moved to a Springfield, Mo., hospital that specialized in a particular kind of surgery he might require.
He would remain in Springfield from May 9 until June 18, undergoing MRI scans of his head virtually every day while doctors waited to determine if the swelling and bleeding from the injury would decrease. Finally, they recommended Josh be moved to a facility that would allow for daily therapy and monitoring of his condition. Instead, the Fisk’s elected to use a Tulsa center where Josh could work on a daily basis, and remain at home.
“After what we’d been through, I just couldn’t bear the thought of him being away,” Lisa Fisk said. I just wanted him home.”
But that decision meant Lisa would have to drive her son to Tulsa every weekday, and drive him back that night.
“He had to be there at 9 (a.m.) and they’d work with him until 3 (p.m.), so we’d leave real early (in the morning) and be home by about 5,” Lisa said. “He’d listen to his Ipod or play some hand-held games on the way over.”
Sometimes they’d talk, and Lisa would look for signs that “the old Josh” the one who did things like take his girlfriend’s sister and some of her friends, all of whom have Down’s Syndrome, with them to dinner on the night of Fisk and his girlfriend’s junior prom.
“He’s made so much progress, but there are times when he’s just not the same,” Lisa said. “The doctors say that part of it will get better with time, and he’s much better than he was.”
He still gets angry, has a shorter fuse than he used to, jokes a little less. Part of that could be the injury, doctors say. But part of it could be what the injury cost him.
“He’s a good player, but he knew he wasn’t going anywhere (to play college football) after this,” Lisa said. “This was it, and now its been taken from him. Some times I wish he‘d just broken his leg once the season started, so at least he could have gotten to play some during his senior year.“
Fisk is still involved with the team, still helping coach Kevin Johnson and his assistants get the Bulldogs ready for the season. Johnson said the former center is still a vital part of the team, and an example of how the community can rally behind its own.
“Josh knows kids on both (high school) teams, and he’s been playing ball in town most of his life, so people know him,” Johnson said. “And Springdale may be two high schools, but the people of this town rally around their kids.”
Josh has new goals now. He’s done with the daily trips to Tulsa, jokes he never wants to go back there, or Springfield, either. But he still has to complete therapy, and there’s a slight problem with blurred vision in one of his eyes, probably as a result of bleeding from the accident.
Now he wants to do what the doctors tell him, mostly so he can get his driver’s license back, and get back behind the wheel of his pickup truck again. And there’s college at his beloved University of Arkansas.
‘He’s a big Hog fan,” Lisa said. “He used to tease the therapists in Tulsa because they were from Oklahoma State.”
He’s on the way back. Lisa says she sees it, a little more every day. And she knows he’ll work hard to make a recovery. That’s his job now, and centers always do their job. They always spin the ball. They’re always looking for the laces.
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