PONCHATOULA – Bryce McKinney’s room at his family’s home on Wildoak Lane in Ponchatoula would make an outdoorsman jealous.

By Bradley Handwerger / WWL-TV.com

Bryce McKinney reaches down from his power chair to pet the family dog. McKinney returned home from rehab in Atlanta on Feb. 11.

The walls are painted a sort of orange that comes out only in the fall when the leaves are departing trees, falling to the ground.

The lower halves of those same walls are made of tough Cypress wood. His floors also are wood, smooth and shiny in their feel and appearance.

French doors open to a backyard and a patio where one possibly could watch wildlife frolic in and out of woods behind the house.

It looks like a Cabelas outdoor store. It’s supposed to.

It’s what McKinney wanted, and nearly five months after becoming paralyzed during a football game, he finally gets to enjoy it.

Bryce returned to his Ponchatoula home from the Our Lady of the Lake Hospital in Baton Rouge and the Shepherd Center Rehabilitation Hospital in Atlanta for the first time since that September night when his injury happened.

And to his surprise, the room was in good shape.

“I didn’t think it was going to be this big, and with my dad building it, I didn’t think it was going to look this good, either,” said Bryce, who turned 17 in the fall. “In order to fix something, he has to tear something up, a couple of times usually.”

And much of the materials that went to build the room were donated.

“The money people raised is what we used to build this,” Bryce’s father Jeffrey said.

The outpouring of support still is something the McKinney’s are trying to wrap their heads around.

“All these people we don’t even know,” Jeffrey said. “We weren’t raised in Ponchatoula. We’ve only been here about 13 years. We graduated from Hammond High. We moved out here 13 years ago. ... People that don’t know us stepped in and helped.”

Added his mother Robin, “Even in Atlanta. We had people that came to Atlanta to see us who have heard of Bryce. People found out that he was an LSU fan and they sent him camouflage LSU shirts and LSU items. They sent it to Atlanta.”

The support isn’t ending any time soon, either.

Fundraisers and costs

Ponchatoula’s downtown will host yet another fundraiser for Bryce and his family on March 1, with former American Idol contestants Lindsay Cardinelli and George Huff, as well as Elvis impersonator Brandon Bennett scheduled to participate.

More than 20 fishing boat captains are auctioning off spots for fishing charters. There’s also a gumbo cook-off, hosted by Ponchatoula High head coach Mike Baiamonte, who will give Bryce his football letterman’s jacket at a ceremony. Several members of LSU’s national championship team are expected to attend, as well.

Members of the LSU Tigers, New Orleans Saints and Georgia Bulldogs signed footballs, hats and helmets for Bryce McKinney, who was paralyzed in a September 2007 football accident.

The money raised, of course, will go to help offset the large expenses of Bryce’s treatment and medication.

Three bottles of medicine, insurance included, cost nearly $200. The $30,000 power chair he now uses was covered by insurance, but a backup manual chair worth roughly $10,000 still needs funding.

The ceiling lift that helps Bryce get in and out of bed – the same one used at Shepherd – is in his room ready to use, but the McKinney’s are still waiting to hear if insurance will cover that. That’s another several thousand dollars.

There’s still more to do at the house. Jeffrey, an employee at Wholesome Bread in Hammond, would like to eventually level out his driveway, making it easier for Bryce to wheel to and from the van they use.

Currently, only the carport is concrete. The driveway is made of racks and pebbles. He eventually would like to pave it.

All of this comes with Bryce’s mother Robin now out of work so she can take him from appointment to appointment and help care for him.

But one way or another, they find a way, usually through the kindness of strangers.

“It happened on a Wednesday, and that Friday, when the varsity went down to play (Northshore High), when they got down there, the Northshore cheerleaders had signs and they collected money,” Jeffrey said. “I believe they collected like $2,500 at that game, just by passing around jars.

“A lot of people donated stuff, a lot of local businesses.”

Donations

Lowe’s donated ceiling fans for the room. A local lumber company sold them wood at cost. Neighbors and friends donated time helping Jeffrey McKinney build Bryce’s new room from scratch. Even the original framer of the house helped.

But the biggest gift of all might be the transport van a Denham Springs resident gave to the McKinney’s.

Anne Morris had a van with barely any use sitting at her home. Only when she heard about what happened to Bryce did she know what to do with the $50,000 vehicle.

“She called the local lawyer in Ponchatoula and said she wanted to donate the van,” Jeffrey said. “Her husband was hurt, too, and he passed away in the last couple of years, so she had the van. A 2004 with 16,000 miles on it.

“She donated the van, bought an extended warranty on it – another five years bumper to bumper. Full of gas. Washed.”

And to this day, the McKinneys said they still hear from Morris from time to time, looking for updates on Bryce.

“It was weird how she didn’t even know me,” Bryce said.

Finally home

Bryce McKinney and his mother Robin talk in the family's Ponchatoula home Monday afternoon

Still, as much as people have donated, including time, one of the best things to happen is the return home for Bryce and Robin.

“It’s exciting to be home to see friends and family,” Robin said. “You don’t have to get through it alone. Speaking for my son, I’m sure it makes it easier on him. He’s home and his friends have been here.”

She doesn’t have to speak for him, though.

“It’s a lot better here,” Bryce said. “Not as many rules, like flying through the halls. I’ve got a new TV and it’s big, so I can watch a lot of stuff. At the hospital, they were like 7-inches big.”

It wasn’t easy, however, to leave Atlanta. For more than three months, it was home. In that time, Robin and Bryce became friends with many also at the rehab center.

“Yeah, there were a lot of people who were friends I met and the people who helped out up there,” Bryce said.

“There are some other ones who want to go back in the summer, too,” Robin said. “We’ll try to maybe organize where we go back at the same time and see how much progress they’ve made.”

Bryce will eventually return to school at Ponchatoula. But rehab comes first. And being home is the next step in that process, Robin said.

“Your mind and body senses how you feel,” she said. “That helps with the healing process. This is the stage in healing he’s in now.”