Heartfelt Thanks for a Life Saved
November 13, 2012
By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor
ELSIE – Like many who have played high school football, the practice field will always be more than just another piece of lawn to Ovid-Elsie’s Chris Fowler.
Over his right shoulder, beyond a few of the fields that surround his high school, sits his family’s house. To his left is the finish to the school’s cross country course his younger sister was preparing to run the day his heart stopped beating.
In this spot, on Oct. 9, the 16-year-old Fowler collapsed while he and his teammates ran 40-yard sprints. His heart, for reasons doctors could not explain, went into an irregular rhythm that caused him to go into cardiac arrest.
“It still doesn’t (make sense),” Fowler said two weeks later. “I try to forget it as much as I can. It’s not worth remembering. I don’t want to think about it.”
But the Marauders sophomore will always remember those who brought him back to life that day.
Thanks to the quick, calm response of Ovid-Elsie football coach Travis Long and his staff, and the speedy work of athletic director Sonya Latz to retrieve the school’s AED device, Fowler’s heart was shocked back to life.
Unlike too many national news stories lately of athletes who died far too soon of similar circumstances, this story ends well.
Fowler’s father Dave knows it is because every detail was carried out to perfection. Standing near the cross country finish line, he was there to watch it all.
“Truthfully,” Dave said, “I thought it was the end of my world.”
Trying to remember, trying to forget
Both father and son knew the story of Fennville’s Wes Leonard, who died from sudden cardiac arrest after making the game-winning shot in a basketball game March 3, 2011.
They hadn’t heard of the all-state football and basketball player before that day, but Dave began following the story as it became national news and spurred an effort to have AEDs in every school.
AED stands for automated external defibrillator. The device combats sudden cardiac arrest by detecting an irregular heart beat and delivering a shock that can put the heart back into correct rhythm. Ovid-Elsie High School has two. The first was purchased through the Kimberly Anne Gillary Foundation, which was started after Gillary, a student at Troy Athens, died of sudden cardiac arrest during a water polo game in 2000. The second was donated by alum and former basketball player Daryl Melvin, now a cardiologist in Lansing.
Chris remembers reading about Leonard’s death the day after and thinking there was no way it could happen again to someone like him.
Dave Fowler recounts in his head daily how it nearly did.
The image he can’t get out of his mind is that of Chris’ coaches flipping him over and starting chest compressions.
“It’s just like it was unreal. It was like a bad dream I was waiting to wake up from,” Dave said.
Chris remembers none of it.
He’s a strong student who even before this was considering becoming a doctor. He’s the middle child of three – sister Maria graduated in the spring, and Morgan is in eighth grade. Basketball is Chris’ favorite sport, and he also played soccer growing up – but frequently was carded for running over opponents.
So logically, in eighth grade, he gave football a try. Two years later, at 6-foot-3 and 265 pounds, Fowler was a starting offensive tackle on the varsity.
The Marauders’ Oct. 9 practice was dedicated to defense. Fowler took a shot to the ankle and rolled it, and remembers mentioning it to quarterback Jake Helms. That was probably about 25 minutes before the team began its daily conditioning, a set of 20 short sprints run at half to three-quarters speed.
Dave watched his son run while waiting for Morgan’s race to begin. Her mom Amy was at the starting line, and their grandparents also were in attendance, part of a larger crowd because the cross country jamboree included multiple teams from all eight schools in Ovid-Elsie’s league.
And then shock. “I knew what was going on,” Dave said. “But it was denial that I was really seeing what I was seeing.”
Call to quick action
Suddenly, Chris was face down on the ground.
Only moments later, Long and assistant Brad Sutliff were flipping him over. Long, a physical education teacher at the school, began the chest compressions. Another coach blew breaths into Fowler’s lungs.
Dave, perhaps acting on instinct as much as anything, yelled for anyone to find his wife. He took off toward Latz, who also had made her way to the cross country finish area, yelling for her to get the AED.
Word of Fowler's dire situation quickly made its way through the crowd. The Bullock Creek cross country team, surely among many others, began to pray. And Dave will never forget watching Chris’ teammates, standing a short way off, yell at him, “Don’t give up! Keep fighting!”
Latz, in the school’s Mule utility vehicle, raced to the trainer’s room, grabbed the AED and raced back. A parent from another school who is a nurse asked if she could help and took the AED to the coaches, who connected it to Fowler.
The AED gives the user explicit instructions on how to operate it, including where to attach connections and when to step away as to avoid also receiving a shock.
Sutliff was holding Fowler’s head and didn't want to set it down. But he had to – the shock was so strong it lifted Fowler’s body off the ground.
The jolt also reset his heart.
The next thing Fowler remembers, he was in the ambulance on the way to Sparrow Hospital in Lansing, vomiting. And he couldn't see. He flashed his hand in front of his face, trying to find it. It was then that he found out his heart had stopped.
After a night at Sparrow, Fowler was taken to the University of Michigan’s C.S. Mott Hospital, where he spent five days. Fowler went through the battery of tests. No problems were found. The family doesn't have a history of heart trouble. Doctors said there were no blockages.
“They said basically that it’s a miracle. There are no side effects, none whatsoever,” Dave Fowler said. “No heart damage, no organ damage. The neurologist said his brain function is perfect; there’s nothing wrong with it. And they all say that stems from the quick reaction from the coaches. … The doctor said he’s never seen chest compressions done that well.”
Ovid-Elsie has a disaster plan in place for situations like these, but had never had to put it into play for a life-threatening situation as long as Latz has been part of the athletic staff – dating back to her first year coaching in 1989.
It went off without a hitch. The whole process of starting compressions, retrieving and hooking up the AED and restarting Fowler’s heart took maybe a bit more than five minutes.
“The coaching staff is amazing, how smooth and calm everybody kept just to do their jobs. I’m just amazed,” Latz added. “I shouldn't say ‘amazed.’ Because I trust that they are very good. I’m just proud of the way they handled everything.”
She added that Ovid-Elsie’s National Honors Society has asked about raising funds to purchase an AED for a school that doesn't have one.
Many thanks to give
Fowler wears two bracelets he received while at U-M. One reads “Hearts working together,” and the other “And the beat goes on.” He was considering becoming a neurologist some day, but now cardiology seems pretty cool.
Fowler’s friends don’t ask much about that day. They know he’s trying to block it out of his memory. But others do ask the “ridiculous questions. Like, you know, what did it feel like to be dead?”
His response: “I just say I wasn't getting oxygen to my brain, so I don’t remember anything.”
The questions don’t make him angry. It’s easy to figure out quickly that Fowler is the type to let such things just roll off.
When Fowler does hear his story re-told, he feels like it’s about someone else.
But he’s a smart guy, and he’s heard enough doctor talk to understand what’s going on.
The biggest bummer is he can’t play basketball. His career in contact spots is over. That leaves golf, and he might take it up eventually. This winter, he’s going to be on the bench with his varsity teammates and he’ll help with the freshmen team and perhaps Morgan’s eighth-grade team too.
He still sounds like a football player. “It’s a lame scar,” he said of the small cut under the front of his left shoulder. Embedded in a “pocket” under his skin on the left side of his chest is an implantable cardioverter defibrillator – or ICD – meant to automatically shock his heart back into rhythm if it falls out of beat again.
Fowler came back for a football practice before the Marauders season ended, and also for the parents’ night game. He’ll still be part of that program next year too. “The joke around town is I’ll be the offensive coordinator,” Fowler said.
Dave still asks himself the what-ifs of that day. He looks at his family differently. Too many times during the day he pictures those chest compressions. It’s hard for him to leave home, and he doesn't sleep well. And he’s pretty sure Chris is getting tired of his parents peeking into his room at night to make sure all is well.
Perhaps. But Fowler also has never been one to take anything for granted – although that’s another part of what makes this situation tough. He’s always one to show gratitude, but he can’t remember right now all the people he’d like to thank. He’s just doing his best.
“I can’t remember. There are so many people. I saw some people at the football game, and I just walked up and said thank you,” Fowler said. “Because they were there, praying for me or whatever.
“I’m very fortunate. It’s unbelievable.”
Click to see more from the Wes Leonard Heart Team or the Kimberly Anne Gillary Foundation.
NOTE: Chris Fowler's parents Dave and Amy would like to give special thanks to those pictured with their son (in suit and orange shoes) above: athletic director Soni Latz and football coaches Brad Sutliff, Eric Jones, Jeremy Palus, Cody Staley, Travis Long and Dustin Thiel.
PHOTOS: (Top) Chris Fowler stands in the place on Ovid-Elsie's practice field where coaches worked to restart his heart on Oct. 9. (Middle) Fowler, in his game jersey, stands on Ovid-Elsie's football field. (Bottom two photos courtesy of the Fowler family.)
A League of Their Own in Illinois
May 20, 2014
By Rob Kaminski
MHSAA benchmarks editor
Imagine the scene: thousands of spectators roaring their approval as hundreds of cross country runners hit the finish line. A couple thousand others cascade applause on the wrestling mats as referees raise the hands of 19 champions.
Now, here’s the kicker, imagine this is taking place during postseason play for junior high/middle school student-athletes.
Again, that’s postseason, and junior high/middle school.
“I guess when you see a kid cross the finish line in first place and 5,000 people are cheering, or watch a student run a race, throw the shot, or pole vault in front of that many at our track & field series, the proof is in the pudding,” said Steve Endsley, executive director of the Illinois Elementary School Association.
“The environment, the feedback we get; it’s the greatest thing in the world to some who experience our tournaments. But, I temper that in saying this is not the Olympics, the pros, or even high school. Success at our level doesn’t guarantee future success. We want you to do your best, we want to prepare you to do your best, but understand this is junior high.”
If understanding that is difficult for some athletes and parents involved in IESA athletics, it’s also a foreign language to state high school associations across the country. The IESA is the only organization in America which exclusively governs interscholastic activities for grade levels 7-8.
Most states include junior high/middle schools in their rules and regulations, but few, if any, conduct tournaments.
“We’ve been doing it for so long, it’s accepted. Schools know that at the end of the regular season, they enter Regional play. The payoff is we have state series, a culminating activity, and it’s a good thing that’s going on,” Endsley said.
From the organization’s first postseason event in 1930 during which boys basketball tournaments took place in a lightweight (boys less than 100 pounds) and a heavyweight division, the IESA has grown to sponsoring more than 20 boys and girls activities.
Measures have been taken in recent years to alleviate travel concerns at the end of the season. The IESA has added classifications in some sports, while keeping the number of teams which advance to the Finals the same. So, for instance, where 16 teams might have gone to two different sites in the past, now four different sites host eight schools.
Admittedly, Endsley adds that the tournament series might add to some competitiveness, but since all schools enter the tournament, there might be less emphasis on winning during the regular season, and thus, heightened participation for those of all skill levels.
“If you don’t want the win-at-all-cost mentality, then step up to the plate at your member school and handle it that way,” Endsley said.
The refrain from association leaders around the country is that success in conveying the values and ideals of school sports is totally dependent on those in charge at the local level. Beginning with the 2012-13 school year, the IESA put more of that load squarely on the individual schools by making it a local decision as to whether students could participate with the school team and a club team in the same sport during the same season.
“From an association standpoint, it seemed like only people we were penalizing when had the limitations were the honest schools which self-reported,” Endsley said. “It was difficult to penalize those schools while everyone else knew the school down the street didn’t report.
“In a perfect world, the participation rule would be in place. But, it’s not a perfect world. Club sports schedule in accordance with high school seasons, but disregard our level when it comes to non-school activity. It’s year-round. So it’s practically impossible to equitably enforce it from a state level.”
There are more than 800 member schools in the IESA, which is an affiliate member of the National Federation of State High School Associations, but a separate entity from the Illinois High School Association.
Endsley estimates the IESA comprises 50-60 percent of eligible schools in Illinois, bolstered by unique membership options which differ from the IHSA and many state associations.
“We offer a la carte membership. A school can offer activities and maybe not participate in our state series. It’s only in those activities in which schools participate in the IESA state series that they must abide by our rules and regulations. Schools want some control. I think a la carte way is the way to go.
“If they join the IESA for one sport, they receive all mailings and information, so maybe one sport gets them in, but they may later add activities. If they are not a member, they don’t know about us.”
Yet, while separate bodies, the IESA and IHSA work hand-in-hand in many respects since nearly 100 percent of the IESA’s students will matriculate into IHSA schools.
“We attend the IHSA activity advisory meetings so we can keep a finger on the pulse of topics they are discussing and items they are considering. From the student standpoint, we will take our champions and introduce them in ceremonies at the IHSA Finals when our calendars line up,” Endsley said. “They get tickets, halftime introductions, pictures in the program, and it’s well-received recognition.”
Such activities are possible because the IESA seasons are different than the IHSA’s in some sports, or end sooner. For instance, the IESA plays baseball and softball in the fall, so its champions are recognized at the IHSA Finals in the spring.
“These activities create exposure and help build interests and aspirations for our schools,” Endsley said. “It’s nice P.R. for both associations.”
Whether different seasons or same seasons, the multitude of events throughout Illinois provides ample opportunity for the state’s contest officials as well. That’s another area in which the IESA and IHSA work together.
“We don’t license officials in the IESA, but we require our schools to use IHSA officials,” Endsley said. “We get great cooperation from the IHSA, it’s a good situation for our schools, and it’s a really good thing for officials. There are always plenty of games, and new officials gain valuable experience.”
Now in the midst of its ninth decade, the IESA continues to expand, adding boys and girls bowling and golf to its roster of activities in 2011.
The Association sponsors athletics for 7th- and 8th-graders, but 5th- and 6th-graders enrolled in a member school may participate with 7th-and 8th-grade teams within that building without a waiver. If such students are in an elementary school which feeds a member school, waivers are necessary.