Brock Riemath

Brock William Riemath 

December 30 1988 - June 17 1997

Age: 8 years old 

Brock's nickname was Rascal. He had a older sister called Deanie who was nine years old at the time. One summers day, Rascal and Deanie were riding in the back of a pickup on their way to a baseball game. When Rascal’s baseball cap flew off, they yelled to their dad to stop the truck. Brock had cleats on and there was loose gravel. Somehow Rascal fell backwards. He fell out and the truck was travelling around forty miles per hour. A pebble hit the bottom of his skull and lodged within a centimeter of his brain. Deanie yelled to their father and he stopped the truck. He immediately saw Brock around twenty metres away and ran towards him. The baseball cap was now around one hundred metres away. Deanie was sobbing, still in the back of the truck.

Brock's dad put his shirt under his head, my brother got the blood out of his mouth, and we called 911. EMT was able to stabilize Rascal, but many anxious days of waiting followed for the Riemath family. Finally, the hospital staff gathered them and discussed what life might be like once they brought Rascal home. He had sustained damage to the frontal lobe. While the discussion was going on, Rascal sat up and coughed. Excess fluid went into his brain stem, and when he lay down, the brain stem herniated. He was on ventilators, and, technically, he was alive, but his brain was dead. The Riemath family had to make the hard choice to remove their son from life support. Brock was able to save nine lives by donating his organs.