Former Solarus lineman Brian Ortner of Wisconsin Rapids is adjusting to a new way of life after being paralyzed on the job in July. Wisconsin Rapids Daily Tribune


WISCONSIN RAPIDS - It was mid-afternoon on a summer Saturday when Brian Ortner, a 39-year-old lineman, husband and father of two young children, stood studying the tree, working out how best to chainsaw it away from a utility line.

The tree was one of countless uprooted, splintered or toppled by a storm that left a swath of destruction across central Wisconsin on July 20.

Brian was working for Solarus, the Wisconsin Rapids-based phone, internet and cable television company, and was part of an army of utility workers who fanned out across the region to restore services for thousands of people affected by the storm.

The winds broke off the top of the tree. It was "sticking up in the air," Brian said, "and it looked almost like a tripod." It leaned slightly to one side. He pushed on it, and he figured with some trimming of the twisted limbs around it, the tree, maybe 2 feet around, would fall that way. 

"I was cutting on it," Brian said, "and I heard a big snap. I thought, 'OK, it's going.'" He ran away from the tree; he had planned his escape route. But the tree didn't fall the way he figured it would. It fell his way.

"It hit me square in the back," Brian said. The blow shattered his spine, and paralyzed him from his chest down.

It could have been even worse, if the tree hadn't snagged on the phone line. He could have been pinned under the tree, and "it would have killed him," said his wife, Amy Ortner, 38.

Amy is an ultrasound technician who works at Aspirus Riverview Hospital in Wisconsin Rapids, and she later showed the X-ray images of Brian's shattered spine to a doctor she knows well. That doctor said the bone fragments of Brian's back were millimeters away from puncturing his aorta.

"He would have bled out in minutes," Amy said.

'I made noises I never thought a human being would make.'

The injury was so bad that a doctor told Brian he would never walk again shortly after he was brought into Marshfield Medical Center. The news barely computed in his mind.

"I knew what he was saying, but at the same time, it was like, 'What can I do?'" Brian said. He thought maybe, he still could fix it. Maybe he could do something to make it better.

But the pain he was experiencing overwhelmed any of those thoughts and just about everything else. It was a burning, achy, throbbing pain that completely consumed him.

"I made noises I never thought a human being would make," Brian said.

Two days after he was admitted, Brian underwent an arduous spinal surgery designed to protect and stabilize his spine. The surgeon told Amy he never had done such an extensive operation, because people in Brian's condition usually don't live long enough to have the surgery. The operation lasted 10 hours, and two 9-inch rods were implanted in his back.

His body is still healing from that and other subsequent surgeries, and it's still adjusting to the trauma it went through. 

"I get a lot of weird feelings," Brian said. "I'll get feelings in my legs, or spasms in my legs.  ... The (nerve) signals are messed up. Sometimes there are certain pains, sharp stabbing pain, at the level of my injury. It doesn't last very long, but it's there from time to time."

Lately, Brian's abdomen has been the source of deep discomfort. "He just feels bloated all the time," Amy said.

He's limited in the amount and kinds of pain medications he can take. "We're still doing a lot of therapy for pain management," he said.

'We just want to live our best life.'

In a split second, Brian's old life was gone, and so was Amy's.

She remembers the feeling she had that first night after Brian's accident.

"You just think, he can't get into our home. He can't get into any of our vehicles. He can't get into our camper. How are we ever going to get him into a boat again?" Amy said. "All of the things we worked really hard to get just to enjoy life with our kids. You know, I don't think we ever wanted to lead an extravagant life; we just want to live our best life. And then it's like: Try again."

It's been about five months since that tree snapped the wrong way near the corner of 15th Street and East Grand Avenue in Wisconsin Rapids, and the Ortners are still trying to figure out their path ahead. They decided to leave their home. It was their first, the one they bought together, an older Victorian home that sat on two lots in Vesper. They loved that house, but Brian's wheelchair couldn't fit through the doors and he couldn't get to two of the levels, the basement or the upstairs. 

It was difficult to leave that house behind.

"We worked so hard to get everything the way we wanted it," Brian said.

Brian was always looking for things to do around the house. He was starting to tap the maple trees on the lot, and making maple syrup. Last spring, he finished a nice patio outside the home.

"And that was really expensive," Amy said with a wry smile. "It's little things like that."

The whole family, including Aubrey, 10, and Bennett, 8, is active. In addition to working around the house, they love camping and fishing together, being outside, going places and doing things.

Those kinds of things are on hold.

Today the family lives in a small two-bedroom duplex on 23rd Street on the north side of Wisconsin Rapids, and the Vesper home is for sale. They bought a tract of country property between Wisconsin Rapids and Stevens Point, and they plan to have a home built that will be accessible to Brian and his wheelchair. The plan is to move in late next fall.

Once they are in that home, Brian sees himself working outside again. Maple syruping. Plowing. Maybe getting back to hunting, which he did before he and Amy had the children. They don't know exactly how they'll get Brian into their boat again, for fishing, but they say they'll figure it out when the time comes.

Meanwhile, Brian does what he can around the house, helping with the children as best he can.

"The kids are adapting well, they are so helpful. They'll help me pick up my feet to get into bed, or putting on my shoes," Brian said. "It's kind of different, now. Instead of me taking care of them, they are helping take care of me." 

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'I don't know when to push.'

For now the emphasis is on getting Brian as strong and healthy as possible. But sometimes the stress of it wears on Brian and Amy. They don't know whether what Brian is experiencing will be the new long-term reality or whether it will get better in time. That kind of doubt affects everything.

The only time he's free from pain is when he is lying on his back. But he and Amy know that he has to get up, has to move, has to continue building himself physically.

Amy will push him to help around the house, but also knows the pain and other challenges he's facing. So, she wonders, is she pushing him too hard? Or is she not challenging him enough?

"That's the frustration and balance for me. When do I let him have his time when he's really in pain, and when do I say, 'Get your butt out of bed and go do something'? Because he's dancing with the line right now, and so am I. I don't know when to push, and when not to push," Amy said.

"The time of year doesn't help," Brian said. "Cold never bothered me before, but now, I could (get) frostbite (on) my legs and not even know it. If it were summer, I could get out and go around the block or something. But I'm kind of confined in here."

'People have invested in us.'

It was only a day or two after the accident when a critical care nurse at Marshfield Medical Center told Amy she needed to start a GoFundMe account or other fundraising effort.

"She said, 'This is big. It's bigger than you can ever realize. ... You will need more money than you realize at this point,'" Amy said.

While Brian was undergoing his marathon surgery, Amy, Brian's sister and his mother created "Brian Ortner's spinal injury recovery fund" on GoFundMe. 

After the first 15 minutes the site was active, people had donated about $2,000. 

"It was an insane amount of money right off the bat," Amy said. "We had, like, about $40,000 in that first 10 hours (before Brian's surgery was complete)."

That's when Amy decided she would post updates on the site every day, to let people know how Brian was doing, and what life with a spinal injury is like. It is a remarkable and forthright journal of their family, all told from Amy's point of view. (She'll throw some shade at Brian when she thinks he's coasting in terms of his therapy and just doing chores around the house.)

Amy said she committed to writing about their journey when the contributions first started. She told Brian about the GoFundMe account and the incredible response it got shortly after he awoke from the surgery.

"I told him we're going to tell everybody everything," Amy said. "Because people have invested in us."

Brian has fuzzy memories of that moment. "I just remember waking up, and her showing me the account," he said. "And you just can't wrap your head around it."

The GoFundMe account wasn't the only fundraiser. Brooks & Thiel Motorsportsdedicated a season of car racing, using T-shirts and stickers to raise money for the Ortner family. Bonita and Mike Wolosek have been organizing a Halloween "Fright For Life" fundraiser for 11 years; this year they donated proceeds to the Ortners. Their efforts were bolstered by contributions from several local labor unions. On Nov. 26, union reps and the Woloseks presented the Ortners with a check for just over $35,000.

The GoFundMe has accrued $117,610 so far. The Ortners' goal is to raise $150,000. That amount will help pay for the new home and other costs that their insurance will not cover, such as lost wages, Amy said.

'That's the hardest part, the frustration.'

Without the donations, the new house would not be possible. The couple also bought a new pickup truck that will be modified so Brian can drive it. It will have a plow so he will be able to take care of the new property.

But beyond the money, the donations and the well wishes buoy both Brian and Amy as they deal with the worst of the accident's fallout.

"I'm thankful to be here, to be able to see everything," Brian said.

His gratitude is bittersweet, though, and he can't help but think about his life before the accident.

"You always want what you had," he said. "The injury is so fresh yet. But that's the hardest part, the frustration. I used to know what it was like to walk into the closet, grab a jacket and put it on. Be out the door in five minutes. That doesn't happen now.

"You hear people talk about depression and stuff. I can see it, it could happen so easily. Right now it's constant frustration. You can't just let it beat you down, and that's the hardest part, because it's so easy to do."

Brian copes by remembering that "I've got tons of support. You always think about the people that sent you cards and stuff and you're almost to the point where people have cared so much that you feel like you can't let them down," he said. "That helps incredibly. You just think, 'Well, Tom in North Carolina, you know, took the time out of his schedule to send you a card and well wishes,' and you think, 'I can get through this. It's gonna get better.'"

People have "been wonderful," Amy said. She's joined Facebook groups for people with spinal cord injuries, and "one of (the group members) said, 'We need to get busy living, not just surviving.' I feel that's what this community has helped us to do. It's helped us make a life, not just survive this life."

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