Wintry mix spreads across Minnesota

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Mary Barsness holds up her cellphone in its smartly covered designer case.

Three 14-year-old boys nod, solemn witnesses to this Little Canada mother's testimony, 

Her son, 15-year-old Willi Bosch, nearly died a year ago after a simple fall off a longboard -- a bigger and faster kind of skateboard.

This is why Willi's mother -- who is also a teacher at Prodeo Academy in Minneapolis -- has joined the Minnesota Brain Injury Alliance in founding "No Helmet No Ride," a program designed to educate middle- and high-school-age students on the importance of helmet use while on bikes, boards and blades.

This is also why Barsness stops by metro skate parks -- this particular afternoon she is at the Fire Barns Skate Park in Little Canada -- to find out why the kids she meets do or don't wear helmets. If they don't wear helmets, Barsness hopes to influence them by sharing her family's story. One way she tries to influence them is by showing them photos of Willi in the pediatric intensive care unit. Another way:

"You all have cases on your phones," she says to the group in the park. "Why?"

"To protect them if they drop," says one of the boys.

"Is your phone more important than your head?" she asks.

"It was July 7, a Monday night," Barsness says of the 2014 accident. "I had stayed behind at our cabin on Madeline Island with the little one. Willi was with his dad. His dad called me at about 8:30 p.m."

Willi's dad, Gerry Bosch, told his ex-wife that Willi had fallen off his longboard.

"His dad said, 'There's nothing wrong with him, he has no scratches, no bumps, but he's not acting right,'" Barsness remembers.

On the way to urgent care, Willi's dad called again.

"He said Willi was throwing up," Barsness says, "and that he was going to go to the emergency room instead of urgent care."

From United Hospital in St. Paul, the news was even worse.

"Willi was belligerent and really disoriented," Barsness says. "They did a CAT scan and found a brain bleed. I asked if I could talk to Willi, but by then he was unconscious."

As Willi was transferred to the Level 1 Pediatric Trauma Center for Children operated by Gillette Children's Specialty Healthcare and Regions Hospital, his mother began driving through a terrible rainstorm to get to her son. She pulled over to take another call from Willi's dad.

"I was on the phone with Gerry when Dr. (Debbie) Song came in to tell Gerry what she was going to do," Barsness says. "I was on speaker listening to her say she was going to perform an emergency craniotomy on Willi. From what I remember, she was explaining that his brain bleed was expanding and that his brain was rapidly swelling. It was completely surreal -- and the most terrifying thing I had ever heard."

When Barsness finally arrived in St. Paul at 4 a.m. on July 8, the post-op news from Song, a pediatric neurosurgeon, was frightening.

"When we asked about his prognosis, she said, 'He's very critical,' " Barsness said. "And someone asked, 'Are you saying he could die?' And she said, 'That's a possibility.' I said, 'No!' and walked out of the room.

"I instantly felt so angry at her, because that was not what she was supposed to say. It's funny now, because there are few people in the world I like more than her: She saved my son's life."

In those dark hours, though, Barsness wasn't certain about her son's fate.

"They had tried to prepare us for what we'd see, but nothing could prepare us for that visual," Barsness says. "For better or worse, I'll never be able to un-see it.

He was on a ventilator. He wasn't doing anything on his own. He looked so unlike himself. He's so bright and shiny and full of light, so full of personality. To see him lying there ... it was really scary."

For three days, Willi's family held vigil at his hospital bedside.

"Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday were really scary," Barsness says. "On Friday, they gave him what they call a sedation vacation, where they lift the meds to see his response.

"And he did everything we asked. He looked to his left, he looked to his right; he grabbed with his left hand, he grabbed with his right. He wiggled his toes. It wasn't without a lot of persuasion; OK, a lot of yelling, really, and it wasn't a lot of movement, but it was an indication that he could hear us and he could understand us and he knew that he had a left side and he knew that he had a right side.

"Everything on Friday morning exceeded our expectations. That's when we started to feel like this was possible. We still didn't know how much of Willi we'd get back, but we knew we were already witnessing a miracle."

"Willi was lucky," says Dr. Mark Gormley, a pediatric rehabilitation specialist. "A lot of people die from the injury he had."

The Hill Murray sophomore can no longer play contact sports — ever. This meant giving up his sport of choice, his passion: hockey.

"Last winter was a very long winter for all of us," says Willi's mom of that first post-hockey season.

Fortunately, new activities have been added: Willi trains with Jason Burgoon of Bodies by Burgoon in Northeast Minneapolis.

"We're working on strength, mostly," Willi says.

Barness found the perfect trainer for her son. Like Willi, Burgoon also survived a traumatic accident as a teen.

"When I was 13," Burgoon says, "I was hit by a van going 55 miles per hour and dragged for 300 feet. I wasn't supposed to live."

Like Willi, Burgoon is grateful for his second chance.

"We have many similarities," says Burgoon, now 34. "We both have had to find new beginnings; we both have had to re-invent ourselves."

At age 13, Burgoon promised himself he'd use his second chance to help other people. More than 20 years later, Willi is one of those people.

"My goal is to help him understand what he is capable of," Burgoon says.

He's capable of a lot. Willi recently took first place -- and broke a state record -- in a power lifting competition. Burgoon is his coach.

At Gillette's Center for Pediatric Rehabilitation, Willi's mother met other parents whose children were also not wearing helmets. Not all of these children got Willi's happy ending. Some are paralyzed; some have debilitating brain damage. This is not unusual; what's unusual is Willi's outcome.

Still, Willi might have not faced surgery, rehab or lifelong consequences if he had been wearing a helmet that summer night.

"On our rehab unit, we just simply don't see patients that were wearing helmets," Gormley says. "The ones who aren't wearing helmets are the ones who are so severely brain damaged that they can't just go home after a week in the hospital. Most of the patients we see have severe, permanent brain damage. In my 25 years here, I can count on one hand the people in our unit who were wearing a helmet."

This is information that Willi's mom wants to share.

"Everywhere I go, it's all I see," Barsness says. "People on bikes or skateboards with no helmets."

Barsness wishes she could knock on every door in Minnesota.

"I wish I could sit at everyone's kitchen table and have this conversation," she says.

She can't, which is why she started No Helmet No Ride.

"This is avoidable," Barsness says of head injuries like her son's. "This is something we can fix. As a parent, there's so much I can't do to protect my kids, or other kids. But this? We can do this. This is very fixable.

"As a kid growing up in the '70s, no one wore seat belts; we didn't have car seats. Now, you wouldn't dream of not wearing a seat belt, or not putting your kid in a car seat. I want to get to that point with helmets. I want it to be as automatic as seat belts."

A few weeks after Barness stopped the three skateboarders to talk to them about helmets, the Pioneer Press messaged one of the boys:

Q: "Did Willi's mom change your ideas about helmets or not really?"

A: "It showed how important it is to keep yourself safe."

A: "No but later I will consider getting myself one."

Q: "Have you gone skateboarding since that day?"

Q: "What went through your mind as you skated?"

A: "I hope I don't get too off-balanced so I won't fall."

Q: "Do you normally think like that or just since Willi's mom."

A: "Yeah a couple of times, but it wasn't that bad."

Still, Willi's mom sees the boy's responses as progress.

"It's not a moment -- boom! -- where everything changes just because I talk to them," says Willi's mom. "I like to think of it as something quieter than that: It's a seed. Maybe they'll be more cautious; maybe they'll wear a helmet. These are seeds that I'm planting."

This is an AP Member Exchange shared by Molly Guthrey of the St. Paul Pioneer Press

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"No Helmet No Ride" is a program designed to educate middle and high school-age students on the importance of helmet use while on bikes, boards and blades.

Minnesota mom educates kids about importance of helmets

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