3/9 - C.R. JOHNSON ON SKIS

3/9/06

I couln't resist just one more CR update. The picture says it all. March 7, West Face KT22. CR on the right with me and Kahlil on the left. An incredible day at Squaw Valley in more than one way. Thanks for the support and love. -Rusty

1/12/05

This concludes the saga of CR's accident. Yesterday, we walked out of the hospital after a 34 day stay. CR's progress in therapy has been nothing short of spectacular. In two days he went from a wheelchair to walking unaided. Today we started occupational therapy and physical therapy and tomorrow we start speech (cognition) therapy. CR will be living with us until he can drive and be independent and it is such a relief and a joy to have him home and our whole family together here again! It has been quite a challenge for all of us. When I think back on the early days it just seems like a nightmare which happened a long time ago. Our family pulled together as strongly as we ever have. I think of Royce (my brother) coming to Salt Lake early on when Lorriane and I were struggling and lending his optimism to every report on CR. CJ and Rick (my sister and brother in law) came out to help us celebrate Christmas and cooked amazing dinners for us which was such a welcome break if only for a few hours. CR's sister Kahlil was always there and upbeat and Lorraine and I needed her positive energy. CR's friends gave endless support. Schoolmates drove from Truckee just to see CR for one night or an afternoon. His compatriot pro skiers spent evenings cheering him up when I'm sure he'd seen plenty of his parents. His sponsors sent presents, came by and pulled for him to return to the ski scene. It has been an astonishing show of love and support from his family, friends, and even fans. Finally, we owe an impossible debt of gratitude to "the U" hospital staff who just saved CR's life. They did that while making us as comforable and informed as possible. The night before we left, CR went up to the nueral critical care unit to thank the nurses and doctors. Of course, he didn't remember them but they sure remembered him and were delighted and amazed to see him walk in. They all crowded up to the front desk to congradulate him. I think stories like his make their jobs worth all they have put into them. Happy New Year to all and thanks again for helping us through this. - Rusty

1/10/06

Mike Douglas and Chris Davenport just returned from a trip to Park City where they had a chance to visit CR in the hospital in SLC.

He's doing incredibly well. So well in fact, that he will probably be on his way home by the time you're reading this. CR recognized us both right away and thanked us for coming. He's very upbeat about his rehab and is thankful to everyone who has sent him messages and visited during the ordeal. He's still having some short term memory problems and some difficulty with his basic motor skills, but that's normal and improving daily. More than anything right now he's just bored and sick of hospital food, so if anyone is going to be in the Tahoe area, stop by and see him. Props to his Mom and Dad who have been there for him everyday. - Mike D

1/7/06

I just returned from a short trip to Truckee and SoCal and even in the three days I was gone CR has come a mile! He is up and around, walking with no aids. Great posture and sure footed. His memory continues to improve and he has the same great attitude and sense of humor as before the wreck. He gets rid of his last tube, an antibiotic IV, tomorrow and will be free of the tower which follows him around everywhere. And best of all, he is scheduled for release on Tues.!! So much progress so fast it is amazing. CR will be returning to our house and living there until he can be independent. Yesterday Ladd Williams, CR's great friend and physical therapist came back to SLC with me and is working the boy over. It's hard to describe how just having Ladd here has improved CR's confidence and spirits. Lorraine, Kahlil and I are so relieved and excited to get the boy home and into familiar surroundings with friends and family. His progress will probably get even better. He is looking at months of physical therapy and speech therapy but he is up for it and I won't be suprised to see CR back on the snow in the spring. As always, we thank all of you for the prayers and energy which have helped us through this ordeal. We quite literally could not have done it alone. All the best, Rusty

1/2/06 - From Rusty Johnson: CR takes his first steps since the accident.

Today was one of those benchmark days we live for. CR walked for the first time! He had a good speech therapy session where he anwsered all the questions correctly. I asked him afterwards if those were easy questions and he said they were. I thought so too but they showed his thinking process was on a certain level. In the afternoon we took CR down to PT in a wheelchair and he returned to his room using a walker! He had to go up four stairs during PT as well, and the therapist said, "Go up with you right foot first, then bring your left foot up and step up the next step with your right foot and and bring the left foot up to that step." NOT! CR went up the stairs right-left, right-left and the therapist said' "Show off!" I had to call Lorraine and say, "Hey Honey, you know that big wheel chair CR used to use back in the day? Well they just took that out of his room, it's gone." Anyway, you can tell I'm excited. Tomorrow is scheduled for 4.5 hours of PT and we hope for more progress. There will inevitably be ups and downs but today along with the day he woke up and the day he was allowed to eat is one of the greats and I'll take it. It was shared with his good friend Pep Fujas and his new friend and former nurse Cody and, of course, his Mom. --Rusty

12/28/05

An update from Rusty, Lorraine and Kahlil...

Alas for the Johnson's the penthouse comes to an end tomorrow but that is good news for CR. He's off to the final stop before coming home and that is nerual rehab! Like I told him, the lying around and snoozing is over, pal. He moves downstairs to the inpatient rehab unit tomorrow and thus begins 3 hours a day of serious hard work. No more private rooms and casual visits. He will room with kids his age range who may have a lot worse outlooks than he does or some who may have it easier. I think it will be a super motivating experience. He can have visitors but they will not slow down the rehab though they can help it if they want. All the good news and recovery progress has been terrific but it has almost all been done lying down. CR cannot sit up on his own much less stand or walk so that is where we start. He is stoked to be getting it going and impatient to get his body to cooperate. How long before he is released to go home we don't know. The ball park generic guess is 2-3 weeks but it could be twice that. Or, as some of us think, it could be less but either way it's a long haul. So Pam and Ladd, start cracking your knuckles, there's work ahead.

12/26/05 Derek Taylor checks in from Salt Lake City

CR made huge strides towards recovery over Christmas. I stopped by for a visit on Monday and was surprised to find him alert and talking in a whisper. He is moving both sides of his body now, and when I arrived, had just gotten back from physical therapy, where he was working on standing again. CR is already showing the same determination that made him a world-class athlete; according to his parents, he asked the physical therapist “don’t give up on me.”

He was able to recognize me and answered a few questions, but most of his conversation was centered on food. After a week of being fed through a tube, he was obsessed with eating again. He waited most of the morning to be cleared by the speech therapist to eat solid food. This, or course, just made him more hungry and frustrated. He kept asking for Mexican food, said he was going crazy with hunger, and that he was “going to snap.” At one point, his father asked him if he remembered what city he was in, and CR responded, “Shit-Hole No-Food City.”

Once the therapist arrived, CR tried to leverage the tests she was asking him to complete to get food. “I’ll do anything you want, just give me some food,” he whispered. The therapist went through a variety of tests, starting water, then juice, apple sauce, and finally graham crackers. The purpose of the test, she said, was to make sure he wouldn’t accidentally inhale food and liquids and further complicate the pneumonia he is fighting off in his right lung. “I won’t aspirate, I promise,” he said, using the nurses terminology.

CR just started to move the left side of his body, so for his final test, the therapist put a cracker in his left hand and let him feed himself. Possibly the most humbling moment of the visit was watching one of the world’s most prolific skiers, someone we’ve grown accustomed to seeing boost 20-foot airs out of the pipe, struggle to stick a cracker in his mouth. When the session was over, however, CR was cleared for solid foods and put on a restricted diet.

According to his mother, Lorraine, some of CR’s most significant breakthroughs of the week have come with Tanner Hall in the room. Tanner was the only one in the room when he opened his eyes for the first time. Lorraine says he ran out of the room to the nurse’s station and yelled, “Yo nurse! Come here quick, he opened his eyes.” The next day CR was awake when Tanner arrived, and CR lifted both arms for the first time.

While his progress is promising, CR has a long way to go before he’s The Johnson’s have gotten hundreds of e-mails at the loveforcr@freeskier.com address, and say they support is making a huge difference. Lorraine says CR is able to read, so keep the positive messages coming.

Snowbird pitched in to help make the Johnson's stay in Shi--er--Salt Lake City as easy as possible by offering free lift tickets to the family so they could take a much-needed break from the hospital and hopefully enjoy the storm forecast for Tuesday and Wednesday.

12/15/05

The following is an excerpt from an e-mail from C.R.’s family:

CR is still in critical condition in the Neuro Critical Care Unit at Utah’s University Hospital. His condition has improved slightly. They removed the Internal Cranial Pressure (ICP) monitor because the pressures are normal and stable. The general brain swelling is subsiding although he still has localized swelling around the injuries. He is off virtually all Meds except for occasional shots of morphine and a rare hit of sedative when he is moved. He responded to pain this morning for the first time in days. This is really good and further evidence of healing in the brain. We have gotten permission to redecorate CR’s room and have begun putting up the cards and pictures.

Well wishes can be sent to an e-mail address set up by Freeskier: loveforcr@freeskier.com. These are being forwarded directly to the family.

12/12/05

According to reports from his sponsors, C.R. Johnson is currently in University of Utah Hospital with severe head trauma. C.R. was filming in at Brighton when the accident happened. He had jumped a cliff and was collecting some lost gear when Kye Petersen launched the same air and collided with him, sources say. According to people close to the scene, as of Friday December 9, C.R. was in intensive care and sedated to aid his recovery.

The accident did not happen in the backcountry, as originially reported, but inbounds at Brighton.

"I think it's important that people know C R was wearing a hemet when this happened," says Evan Raps, who witnessed the accident. "We all decided to wear them full time this year. Unfortunately the impact was below the helmet brow. People should know this was an accident and a freak thing."