‘The light at the end of the tunnel’
Last May, during the summer before his senior year as a business major and football player at Waynesburg University, Kurt Detwiler was a passenger in a fatal one-car crash, which resulted in an above-the-knee amputation of his left leg.
Kurt was in a coma for nearly three weeks after the crash and spent the next 3 1/2 months away from home in the hospital and in outpatient care.
Since the crash, Kurt has undergone more than 30 surgeries — most of them within the critical weeks following the accident.
But today, after months of grueling rehab and dealing with the reality that life will never be the same, Kurt can walk.
“It shows me the light at the end of the tunnel here…that I’m going to be alright.”
***
Kurt officially got his prosthetic leg on Feb. 18, but he had walked with a prosthetic a few times before that. He started walking with a walker, but has since progressed to using just the assistance of a cane.
Kurt still remembers those first steps with his prosthetic leg a few months ago. What stands out to him the most is the look on his mom’s face.
“My mom was there, the doctors were there, and they were so proud,” he said. “Just seeing how proud my mom was that we’ve come that far and have been able to do that. I was more happy that she was happy than I was that I was walking.”
These past six weeks with the leg have been brighter than the previous eight months were for Kurt.
“I’ll be honest, before I didn’t do anything. I sat in bed at night and through the day,” he said. “I didn’t do anything other than watch TV, went to therapy here and there, came back and sat in bed. I didn’t do anything and didn’t have the motivation to do anything.”
Now, he enjoys the little things he can do that he couldn’t for those eight months: getting a glass of water, picking out his clothes or going on walks on the trails with his mom and aunt.
“You take a lot of things for granted when you can do them and then when you can’t it sucks, you know, those little things,” he said. “And then you get it back, and it’s amazing and you just want to do everything.”
The little things, while important to Kurt, won’t outweigh the joy of eventually returning to Waynesburg University as a student. He thinks he’ll be able to return for next semester.
“I’m happy to just have the chance to come back to Waynesburg for everything that the whole school has done for me,” he said. “I want to finish up there. I don’t want to go anywhere else.”
Kurt’s friends and family tell him how much happier he looks since he got his leg. Head football coach Rick Shepas said Kurt, who was with the team this week at spring practice, is “glowing,” something that was not the case months prior.
As the light at the end of the tunnel draws nearer, Kurt said his mood and way of living are both much improved.
“Now, I can honestly say I’m always walking around,” Kurt said with a chuckle, as if it’s still a surprise he can walk again.
“I’m getting back to my normal self like I was before the accident. It feels amazing.”
***
Kurt’s mom doesn’t want him to drive. She can’t help but think of the car crash that nearly took her son’s life.
She said every time Kurt leaves the house, she is anxiously awaiting his safe return–the return that didn’t happen last May.
“He may be 22 years old, but no matter how old your children are, you still worry about them,” she said.
“But when your child is laying there, and I’ll be quite frank, and Kurt never should have made it, and he did. But that’s always in my mind, and I know [how far] he’s come from in these 11 months. As a parent, I just stress every time he leaves the house with somebody that he could be in another car accident. Something can still happen, and that will always be in my mind.”
But as Kurt works back to a place where he feels like his old self, getting back behind the wheel is important.
***
So, a few weeks ago, Kurt and his brother went driving.
Down the back roads of Williamsburg, Pennsylvania, Kurt drove his brother’s green Ford F-150. It’s the first time he had driven a car since before the accident.
For the months following the accident, the thought of driving frightened him. Even today, he isn’t completely comfortable with the idea of driving.
“I still am sketched out with it,” he said. “If we get anywhere close to anything I get really sketched out, anxiety and everything.”
Still, Kurt said he’s made the decision to reinstate his driver’s license by this summer. And with every decision like that one, the tunnel gets a little shorter.
***
Sometimes, for Kurt, that light at the end of the tunnel seems farther away than ever.
The doctors tell Kurt that his left leg–the prosthetic–is his “good leg.” They say it’ll probably be his “good leg” for the rest of his life.
Kurt’s therapy revolves around strengthening his right leg.
In the crash, he tore all four ligaments in his right knee and lost a large percentage of his calf muscle. He has no feeling from his shin down to his foot, and the leg’s mobility is extremely limited.
Doctors have suggested putting a metal brace on his right leg that would extend all the way up to his hip. Kurt called it a “Forrest Gump” brace.
He doesn’t want to use that.
The doctors think the solution could be more serious, though. They have attempted to convince him to decide to amputate the right leg, his last leg.
“I would never be able to make that decision,” he said.
***
Kurt made it home from therapy in record time–about half the time his doctors anticipated, actually–and that was after he broke the hospital’s record for how far someone with a prosthetic leg can walk in six minutes.
Kurt’s mom said that competitive mentality is something in Kurt’s DNA. He wants to prove people wrong and is a consummate competitor.
And it’s a good thing, because even though Kurt’s life has improved, a lot of his home life hasn’t changed.
He still takes an inconceivable number of medications–about 26 pills a day. He still is in and out of doctor’s appointments and checkups. He still has therapy, now three days a week.
But the things that have changed make all the difference.
Kurt used to be a gym rat. Shepas said he was a leader in the weight room for the football team. Part of Kurt’s identity, the weight room, was lost in the accident. Since getting the prosthetic leg, he’s gaining that identity back.
For the past few weeks, Kurt has been waking up at 6 or 7 a.m. a few days a week to work out with a friend.
At first, getting back in the weight room was intimidating. But now, the bench press, the shoulder press, the bicep curls… he can’t get enough of it. That competitive DNA his mom said he has, what his friend called “drive,” pushes Kurt through the weight room and is pushing him through everything else in his life that is remarkably different than the one he lived for his first 21 years.
***
Kurt’s prosthetic leg is the “basic” leg that was covered by his insurance. Kurt and his family are waiting to purchase a more advanced prosthetic leg until he masters the leg he has now.
That leg, which Kurt hopes to have within the next year, could cost upwards of $100,000. The Waynesburg University community has held several fundraisers this academic year to help Kurt’s pursuit of that leg, which would allow him to further his attempt to get back to where he was before the crash.
The consistent support from the Waynesburg University community is something Kurt will forever be grateful for. It shows him that light at the end of the tunnel.
***
Kurt’s mom remembers walking in a parking lot recently and Kurt fell down. She said if it was her, she would have been embarrassed and would have started crying.
“Not him,” she said, crying. “He just got up and acted like nothing happened and was determined to keep on walking.”