 "Photo: Holly Pablo / The Advocate")
LOS ANGELES — When Wali Wright moved to the Bay Area last June from his hometown of Pasadena, he was excited to start somewhere fresh and provide a better pathway of opportunities for his family by continuing his education.
The 25-year-old enrolled in general education courses for the fall semester and joined the football team at Contra Costa College. He looked forward to being reunited with his fiancée and meeting their then-unborn child.
Lying in a bed at Chalet Hospital in Los Angeles, a ventilator supporting his breathing and a trachea helping him speak, Wright now finds it difficult to see what the future has in store for him.
Nearly nine months ago, the freshman player was hospitalized after incurring life-threatening injuries during the first play of the season-opening game at home on Sept. 5.
He does not remember much of what happened.
As the Comet defensive back sprinted at full speed to tackle his target, a Los Medanos College running back, they collided in an angle that fractured Wright’s neck in two places and sent him landing on his back, CCC athletic trainer Brian Powelson said.
“From that point, he didn’t move. I got there and when I was shouting his name, he wanted to respond. He was looking straight at me,” Powelson said. “But in a matter of seconds, his eyes rolled back.”
Time came to a standstill, as it was realized that Wright was not breathing, he said, and with the assistance of LMC athletic trainer Annie Martin, they stabilized his head and tried resuscitating him while summoning ambulatory services.
“In situations like that, the seconds are critical,” Powelson said. “The thought crossed all of our minds: ‘Is he gonna die right here on the field?’”
After being resuscitated by Powelson and Martin, and treated by paramedics, Wright was transported to John Muir Medical Center in Walnut Creek, where he underwent a tracheotomy and major surgery to secure the fractures in his neck, which still have not completely healed.
He said he remembers waking up from the accident approximately a week later.
Hospitalization
Having blacked out from the impact of the collision, Wright remembers feeling confused when he started gaining consciousness as he slowly awoke in a hospital bed.
As a result of bruising his spinal cord, he was paralyzed from the neck down. Slowly, he began regaining feeling in his limbs, he said, but was unable to move them.
Frustrated by being unable to speak, his only means of communicating with hospital staff and family was through mouthing words and having people read his lips.
“I told them that I wanted to go home, but everyone told me that I couldn’t,” Wright said. “They had me hooked up to too many machines.”
Though doctors initially were unsure if he would ever regain mobility of his limbs, he showed perseverance when he first achieved the ability to shrug his shoulders, shake or nod his head and wiggle his toes on Sept. 20, mother Piola Wright said.
She said that after nearly two months, her son was transferred in late October to Kentfield Rehabilitation and Specialty Hospital in Marin County, where attendants closely monitored his mobility.
He attended physical therapy sessions, in which the assistants helped him stand and support himself against balancing framework, sit upright in a wheelchair and work on his hands with simple extension exercises.
Wright said that occasionally, he tried to walk freely and on treadmill machines, but found that his body was too weak to attempt this task.
As he was able to have visitors at Kentfield, his teammates and the athletic department staff brought him a signed team football and his jersey. At this point, he was able to speak softly, as his lungs began to strengthen, his mother said.
Sophomore linebacker Yanni Iosua said that because the team became close during conditioning and many people consider him a brother, it was good to see and talk to Wright again.
For the rest of the season, Iosua said, the team wore Wright’s number on their helmets to symbolize the team love and support they feel for their teammate.
One challenge that Wright faces is that he caught pneumonia during this time, Piola Wright said, and because his immune system is delicate as a result of bed rest, his condition fluctuates.
Despite the progress he was making previously, breathing on his own for a few weeks at a time, the bouts of the sickness are a concern, so doctors insist that he stay on the ventilator until he fully recovers from it, she said.
In order to be closer to his family, Wright was transported by ambulance to Northridge Hospital Medical Center in Los Angeles in March, his mother said.
He stayed there for two weeks before being transferred on April 9 to his current location at Chalet Hospital, a rehabilitation facility that is part of Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center.
“He’s still just like he was when he was at Kentfield, except he’s actually doing a little worse now,” Piola Wright said.
Slow recovery
Since relocating to Southern California, Wright said that he worries his chances for a full recovery are slipping away.
He is no longer undergoing the necessary physical therapy, because the medical insurance he is currently receiving from the state does not cover these treatments.
“I want to walk again and get better for my daughter,” he said. “But how am I going to get fully recovered without rehab?”
Instead, with his fiancée Sara Talamantes and their 3-month-old daughter Tierra Gene by his side each day, Wright passes his time watching TV and listening to music.
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