Editor's note: Mike Uva, a senior at St. John's Prep from Peabody, is a football teammate and close friend of Jared Coppola. Coppola spoke with Uva and, for the first time since his spinal injury five months ago, shared his thoughts with the public on what happened that day, how his rehabilitation has gone and how it feels to be back home and back in school:
September 4, 2009.
It was just another day of Massachusetts high school football as St. Johns Prep headed to Manning Field in Lynn for a preseason game vs. Lynn English. After an offensive series from both teams, it seemed as if it was going to be just another ordinary scrimmage.
Yet when the Prep defense took the field for their second series, one of the most horrific injuries in Massachusetts schoolboy football history occurred.
"I was playing cornerback and the (Lynn English) wide receiver ran a short stop route," explained 17-year-old Jared Coppola, reliving the play that changed his life with the public for the first time.
"As he went up for the ball I hit him — and the next thing I knew I was lying on my back and not able to get up."
As he lay on the ground after the play, one of Coppola's teammates — knowing how tough Jared is — knew something was wrong.
"When I went over to him, I was like, 'What are you doing? Get up'," said senior linebacker George Sessoms. "But he just stared at me and said 'I can't.' I could tell by the look in his eye that something was wrong.¬
"I'll never forget that look. I immediately told people to get the trainer over because something was wrong and Jared couldn't move."
As team doctors from both teams rushed the field along with Eagles head coach Jim O'Leary, players and spectators could only look on and hope for the best. At the time, no one knew what exactly Jared had injured.
"I fractured my fifth cervical vertebrate (C5) in my neck, which resulted in losing all movement from my chest down," Jared said.
He was then immediately rushed to Children's Hospital Boston where the junior was comforted by his parents, Dawn and Skip, as they stood by his bedside along with his triplet brothers, Brandon and Tyler. His older brother Derek and sister Brittany were away at college at the time and would receive the news later that night.
"I was in my dorm the night before the first football game of the season (for the University of New Hampshire) when I got a call from my mom saying Jared had been hurt in a scrimmage," said Derek Coppola. "I was shocked to hear that he hurt his C5 in his neck because Brandon had fractured the same vertebrate less than a year ago in a game."
Successful surgery
Later that night, myself along with coaches Jim O'Leary and Paul Uva were able to see Jared at the hospital.
When I went over to him tears began to fill my eyes, knowing all the hard work he had put in for the upcoming season. I tried to stay strong to show Jared that everything was going to be all right.
The first thing he said to me was, "So did we win the game?" He was unaware that the game had been stopped after his injury because players from both teams were not in the right mindset after seeing what took place.
I knew I couldn't explain that to him, so I simply said "Yes Jared; we won" (which brought a quick smile to his face for a couple seconds.)
Later that night, Jared went into surgery.
"It was the first time I had ever broke anything, so I was a little nervous," he admitted. "But at the same time, I felt that I was in good hands with Dr. Snyder and Dr. Proctor performing the surgery."
It took nearly eight hours, but the surgery was a success.
"They fused my fourth, fifth and sixth cervical vertebrates together in order to stabilize my fifth (C5)," Jared explained.
Jared spent the next several weeks at Children's Hospital Boston before being flown to The Shepherd Center in Atlanta, Ga. The facility, Jared said, is considered to be one of the best spinal cord rehabilitation centers across the country for adolescents.
"That's why it was so important to try to get me down there, because it's what they specialize in," he said.
Overwhelming generosity
Jared began his first process of recovery by performing different types of therapy several days a week.
"Therapy would start at 7:30 a.m. with an hour-and-a-half of occupational therapy, followed by an hour-and-a-half of physical therapy and finish with an hour of recreational therapy," he said. "Each day I felt that I was getting stronger, which gave me the strength to work hard every day I was down there."¬
Jared was working hard each day both physically and mentally and admits the whole experience was tiring and hard. He missed his friends back home greatly and felt he was "out of the loop," as he put it. It wasn't the easiest thing for him to text his friends at first, but he found other ways to communicate back home from Georgia.
"I communicated with some of my friends through Skype, which kept me up to date on things going on back home," said Jared. "I was also able to watch my football team play their last three games thanks to Peabody Access (Television), which was something special for me to see."
He was aware that there was a foundation in his name in order to help with his expenses, such as the flight to Atlanta and his surgery. But what Jared was unaware of how big it was growing and how much money people from all over Massachusetts, as well as parts of Georgia, were donating.
"It was an amazing feeling to know how generous people can be," Jared said with a smile. "To know that so many people were behind me in my recovery only motivated me even more to work harder each day."
Positive outlook
Less than four months later — 105 days, to be exact — Jared Coppola returned to his North Reading home on Dec. 18.
"Returning home was something I was looking forward to ever since I was lying in that hospital bed in Boston," said Jared with his brother Brandon by his side. "I was so excited to know that it was before Christmas. And because my brother and sister were returning home from college for break, I knew that our family would be complete again and it brought us closer."
Although Jared is home, he is still hard at work each day as he performs some of the activities that he was doing when he was at the Shepherd Center in Atlanta.
"A physical therapist comes to my house several days a week in order to continue my progression in the process of my recovery," explained Jared. "After the flight back from Atlanta, I was really tired but I was able to fight through it and continued to do what I needed to in order to complete what my therapist asked me to do."
On Jan. 5, Jared returned to St. John's Prep for the first time since last June.
"I was really excited to see all of my friends that I hadn't seen since the day I got hurt," said Jared. "It was also the first piece of putting my life back together, taking it one day at a time."
Today, Jared is still unable to walk. But the strides he has made since September are very promising. He lives every day to the fullest and doesn't let this speed bump come in between him and his personality.
"I'm feeling a lot better and have regained movement and feeling throughout my body," he said. "The issue right now is getting my muscles strong again so that I'll be able to get up and walk.
"I feel I have a good chance to walk again, but I know that this is just the beginning of the next process in my road of recovery. No matter what the challenges are that lie ahead of me, I am determined to walk once more."
