Mike Welch family reflects on impact of his mid-December hunting accident

by Brianne Eilers

December 16, 2011 was a beautiful day, as far as December days go in northeast Iowa. It was sunny and about 30 degrees on that Friday during the Second Season of the Iowa Shotgun Deer Season. “It was a good day for hunting,” noted Mike Welch of Lansing.
Mike has been deer hunting since he was a kid, and December 16 happened to be his 36th birthday as well. It also became a day that Mike and his family and friends will probably never forget; not because of some amazing trophy buck or doe that he harvested, but because it could have potentially been the last day of his life.
“We were on the second drive of the morning,” Mike explained. “It was about 10 or 10:30 in the morning.” Mike was standing on a bluff with another member of their hunting group when a shotgun slug struck him in the head. He then fell about 75 feet off the bluff. He explained that what probably happened was that when a deer was shot, the slug went into the deer and ricocheted through the deer and into the back of his skull.
When members of the group reached Mike after he fell from the bluff, he was unconscious, but came to. Group members were initially worried that he had, in fact, been hit by a slug, but then it seemed like maybe he had injured his head during the fall. Mike said he doesn’t remember anything after he was shot. There is a period of about two days that he has no memory of at all. His wife, the former Carrie Baxter, explained that Mike had been able to stand after his fall and tried to walk, but fell again.
The other hunters had to carry Mike out of the woods, a distance of about two and a half football fields, to a pick-up truck. From there, they drove out to the ambulance waiting on the road, and the ambulance transported Mike to a helicopter waiting at Beetem Hill. “The New Albin EMTs were there,” Mike said. “They did an excellent job at getting me situated and calling in the helicopter.”
Carrie was at work while all this was happening, and once she found out, she rushed to Gundersen-Lutheran Hospital in La Crosse, WI, where her husband had been air-lifted. They didn’t know that there was a slug lodged in Mike’s head until after a CT scan revealed that fact. Carrie was able to see her husband around 1 p.m. before they sent him in for surgery to remove the slug. The slug had sheared off a major blood vessel in Mike’s brain, and then become jammed into the artery, which actually turned out to be a very lucky coincidence, since it helped to staunch the blood flow. “They said if it hadn’t done that, he would have bled out in three minutes,” Carrie explained. Mike added that the fact that the temperature was around 30 degrees also worked in his favor, as it helped to slow down some of the body processes.
After the initial surgery, there was a bit of a waiting game to see how Mike’s brain would respond to having a major blood vessel being disrupted. His body would have to figure out how to re-route the blood flow. Carrie said that when her husband finally woke up a few days after surgery, he knew her and talked to her, which was a huge relief. No one had really known what to expect.
Mike spent three days in the Intensive Care Unit, then he was moved to the Cardiac Unit because he was having heart problems, which they explained can happen with head trauma. After being in the Cardiac Unit for two days, he was then moved to the Rehabilitation Unit for the next nine days. Mike had to spend the holidays in the hospital, and from the time the accident happened he didn’t get to see their little girl, Lucy, until Christmas Day. “At first, she was kind of scared,” Mike said, because he was bandaged up, but he added that now Lucy is quite protective of her dad. He was able to leave the hospital December 30, and could continue his rehab therapy in Waukon.
However, a complication involving leaking spinal fluid forced Mike to have another surgery in January to repair a hole in the membrane of his brain. “I had a hole about the size of a silver dollar,” Mike explained. “They sewed the membrane of a cow heart in there to seal it.” He also has a small piece of mesh attached to his skull to help promote bone growth to heal the slug entry wound.
There have been other complications as well, some of which may improve over time, and some that have been slowly getting better. Mike explained that he has lost some of his eyesight, his peripheral vision on the right being especially affected. Carrie noted that the right side of both of his eyes had been initially affected, but they both agreed it has improved quite a bit.
In his first days of therapy during his initial hospital stay, he had to relearn a lot of everyday actions. He also had some trouble with walking, due to the fact that he had been used to having perfect vision his whole life and now he was finding he had problems with balance, stability and depth perception, as well as not being able to see everything around himself. Reading smaller print can be pretty hard for him to do, as well.
At first, Mike also had some issues with his short-term memory, but says that has gotten better. He says his long-term memory is still good. He says his eyesight is slowly improving, and he’s had time to adjust to the changes so he can cope better with getting around. Despite what some people might see as some pretty looming challenges, Carrie says that she thinks Mike is keeping a good attitude about it all. “He’s one of the most positive people I know,” she said.
Mike can’t drive for a while, which means that he and Carrie have had to find ways to make it work for him to get to his therapy appointments and things. They have a strong support system of family and friends who have been helping them out and also stopping by and visiting with Mike while he was in the hospital, or now that he is home, and they also take him out and about. While in the hospital, Mike’s nurse noted that he couldn’t believe the amount of visitors and different people who came to sit with Mike. “He said ‘you just don’t see that amount of support anymore.’ That’s what got us through,” said Mike and Carrie.
Mike works at Innovative Ag, where he was doing a lot of crop applications and spraying. “I’d spend eight months a year spraying and spreading fertilizer, things like that,” he said. His co-workers will come and pick him up, so he can spend time in the shop or helping out with whatever he can. Mike is hoping to be cleared for driving within the next six to 12 months, but in the event that doesn’t happen, he said there would be other options for him in the ag business.
Mike also has a beef cattle operation, which he hasn’t been able to spend much time at since the accident. He said one of his brothers has been helping him out with those chores. “It can be frustrating not being able to go out and do some of those things myself,” Mike notes. In March, he’ll be able to visit with an eye specialist to see what options are open to him on that front. Mike continues to do his therapy at Veterans Memorial Hospital in Waukon. “They are amazing people who are trying to get me back to the old Mike,” he says.
Mike gives a lot of credit for the fact that he is still alive to the people who helped him out on the day he got shot. His hunting group made the right decisions and acted fast once the accident happened, and the New Albin EMTs had made the decision to call in the helicopter. “They saved my life,” Mike says, also crediting the doctors and staff at Gundersen-Lutheran for their life-saving work as well.
While things are still not back to normal for Mike, Carrie and their family, they are keeping a positive attitude about his prognosis, and Mike even hopes that maybe in a year or so he’ll even be able to get back to deer hunting. “I might have to take this year off, but I’d like to get back to it, if my wife lets me out of her sight!” he said.
A benefit event is being held for the Mike Welch family Saturday, March 31 at the Allamakee County Fairgrounds Pavilion in Waukon. There will be a silent auction, a bake sale, and a dinner will be served from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. A live auction will start at 7 p.m. Donations for the event can be dropped off at Northgate Care Center or Innovative Ag in Waukon before the benefit, or they can be dropped off at the pavilion the day of the event, starting at 2 p.m. An account for the Mike Welch Benefit has also been set up at Farmers & Merchants Savings Bank in Waukon to accept monetary donations. For more information on the benefit, contact Jamie Phipps at 319-415-0304, Laura Baxter at 563-568-8534, or Jill Roffman at 563-380-8281.