Lake Stevens gym teacher returns after losing leg in crash

LAKE STEVENS -- Fourteen first-graders walked through the gym door at Skyline Elementary and excitedly looked down at their physical education teacher.

They hadn't seen Brad Hodge in nearly six months.

As he wheeled himself over, kids started shouting questions.

"Did you get in an accident?" "Did you get a fake leg?" "Are you hurt?"

"OK, yes I did get hurt," Hodge said, smiling. "I was in an accident. They gave me a new leg. I said I didn't want this leg anymore, so I traded it in."

He lifted his left pant leg, showing off a metal prosthesis that connects to his real one right below the knee.

A boy shouted, "You're Inspector Gadget!"

The kids couldn't take their eyes off the gleaming leg.

"You want to see the coolest thing?" Hodge asked. "This leg comes off -- just like Inspector Gadget. It can come off if I get tired with it or if I want to hit you with it."

He slid up the brace that holds his prosthesis in place and tugged the leg off.

The students stared, some with open mouths.

"Oh my gosh! You are Inspector Gadget, but you don't have a flying jacket, a hat and a ticking car," a boy yelled in amazement.

Hodge's first day back at school was better than he expected. He was worried kids would scream or run away in tears. That didn't happen.

Hodge, 41, doesn't remember anything about the crash.

He doesn't remember waking up on Oct. 9 and climbing into his red Ford Ranger pickup and leaving his Granite Falls home for Skyline. He doesn't remember hitting a gravel truck head on, being cut from the smashed remains by firefighters and flown in a helicopter to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle. He doesn't remember the weeks he spent in a medication-induced coma, or the exact moment he woke up.

His memories are hazy. His dreams were vivid. And he's not sure what really happened in the weeks following the crash.

He remembers talking on the phone to his mom in Vermont, and he remembers a doctor asking if he was ready to talk about his leg.

Until that moment, he hadn't realized it was missing.

"You look down and you just don't see one," he recalled. "It took me a couple days to get myself wrapped around the fact that I don't have a leg anymore. You can't cry and whine about it. It doesn't change anything. You just have to keep a positive attitude."

The 16 years Hodge spent with the National Guard helped him learn to adjust to new realities, without mourning his old life. As a sergeant with an Everett-based unit in Iraq, Hodge survived the explosion of an improvised explosive device. He said he was treated for post-traumatic stress disorder and neck and back injuries, but continued serving until his contract was up.

He thought about his experiences with the National Guard as he lay in a hospital bed fighting infections and, later, as he endured painful physical therapy. He also thought about his kids.

Get well banners hung in his hospital room. Stacks of homemade cards helped him realize he was missed.

Hodge is divorced and doesn't have any children. His parents have visited from Vermont to make his one-story home wheelchair accessible, but he's also leaned on colleagues from Skyline Elementary.

They've organized fundraisers to help pay medical bills and cooked meals so he doesn't have to.

"It's been an emotional roller coaster," Skyline Elementary principal Dave Bartlow said. "We'd get some tragic news and then he gets better and then he struggled health-wise, then he gets better. ... We just want to help. He's part of our family."

Hodge has always been an athlete. He played baseball in college and wrestled and played football as a kid. He's coached a slew of sports, including high school softball.

He's not planning on giving up on that part of his life.

"My days of rope climbing and things might be over for a while," he said, taking a break between classes Monday. "Things like that might be beyond me, but I imagine pretty soon things will be normal."

Hodge always knew he'd return to class. His kids helped get him through his injuries and he missed them.

After months of surgeries and rehabilitation, he returned home on Jan. 28.

Teachers told students about his amputation and tried to prepare them for his scheduled Monday return.

"I think it's time," he said. "You take it step-by-step until your life is semi-normal -- or whatever normal's going to be from now on. It is what it is. You piece it together."

Back in the gym, several minutes into class, all eyes still stared, transfixed, on a metal leg and a hollow pant leg.

"Just so you know, there's a few things that are different, but otherwise I'm the same," Hodge told his students.

He listened to a few injured-leg stories.

The uncle who lost his leg in a bike accident.

The grandma who used a walker until she died.

The classmate who hurt his foot.

Then Hodge announced, "We're going to do scooters."

Kids cheered.

"You're going to get scooters off the scooter rack," he said, just like old times. "Remember, no accidents. I don't want your scooter hitting anyone or anything."

He put his leg back on and wheeled along with his students on the gym floor.

He moved on.



Kaitlin Manry: 425-339-3292, kmanry@heraldnet.com.