‘I had my life ripped apart’

Just over a year ago, ex-Taranaki basketballer Craig Hickford lay in Dunedin Hospital on life support after suffering severe brain damage. Christopher Reive speaks with him as his recovery continues.

Craig Hickford walks around the upper balcony of New Plymouth’s TSB Stadium chatting with his old Taranaki BP Bears team mates. At a glance, you wouldn’t know that a little over a year ago he was in hospital fighting for his life.

On February 14, 2016, the former Taranaki, Manawatu and Canterbury basketballer was knocked off his bicycle by a ute in Dunedin. Ambulance officers worked on him at the scene before he could be transported to Dunedin Hospital where he lay unconscious for 11 days.

Hickford suffered injuries across his brain, including extensive bruising to the right temporal lobe and having the other three major lobes – the occitipal, frontal and parietal lobes – ‘‘smashed.’’

When he woke up, it was like he was starting his life from scratch.

‘‘It was very desperate times for me to be at that level again. I mean, I used to coach at NBL level. I had my life ripped apart,’’ he says.

‘‘I couldn’t feed myself, I couldn’t talk, I couldn’t write, and I’m currently learning to read. It’s been an interesting year, let’s put it that way.’’

The four major lobes of the human brain are essential for people to fully function. The frontal lobe plays a large role in voluntary movement and conscience, the occitipal lobe plays a role in vision, the temporal lobe plays a large part in long-term memory and hearing, and the parietal lobe plays a part in sensory integration, being where touch and taste are processed.

‘‘At one stage, very early on, my parents were told that I may not live, so it’s humbling to get through that and come out fighting. I’m punching well above my weight.’’

At the time of the incident, Hickford was the principal at Brockville School in Dunedin. He moved to Dunedin with his wife, Stacey, and children, Grace, 8, and Toby, 5, after their house was damaged in the Christchurch earthquake.

However, following the incident, not only was he unable to work, but Stacey gave up her job as a legal secretary to take care of him and their children.

‘‘It’s incredibly hard on my wife,’’ he says with a shaky voice.

‘‘I’ve now got to the stage where I’ve started to develop and now I can go out and play with Toby outside and we have games. I kick a ball to him and it’s just amazing to be able to do that stuff, and to have the opportunity to do that stuff.’’

Since Hickford has been out of hospital, the family have moved from Dunedin to Christchurch, moving in next door to Stacey’s parents, allowing Stacey to go back to work.

‘‘That’s a blessing. One of the things with that is it’s just been really good to have that support network there for Stacey.

‘‘She’s a lovely lady and she deserves so much and my kids deserve so much. They deserve more than this.’’

Despite doubts over whether he would live, Hickford says he refused to adopt a negative mindset and kept his thoughts on his family.

‘‘I have never really had the thought that I couldn’t pull through. But I’ve battled with the idea of being a partner and being so reliant on my wife all the time.’’

He saw his trip to New Plymouth last weekend as a way to give Stacey some time off. Despite hailing from the area and still having family in Taranaki, it was the first time he had been able to make the trip up by himself since the accident.

During his visit, Hickford and his family laid his Nana to rest. She died while he was unconscious.

‘‘They cremated her and finally buried her today, a good year and a bit later. They waited until I could understand it. I really appreciate my family for that honour.’’

Hickford played for the BP Bears in the NBL in the early 1990s, before moving on to the Manawatu Jets in the mid-90s and the Canterbury Rams in the late-90s and early 2000s. He later coached the short-lived Christchurch Cougars.

Steve McKean, who coached Hickford as part of the Bears, says Hickford was one of his favourites to coach and the two remain close to this day.

‘‘He wasn’t afraid to challenge you,’’ McKean says.

‘‘He was always a tough kid, and that probably shows why he’s pulled through his injury as well as he has.

‘‘He’s come out a lot better than a lot of us thought he would. He’s hung in and shown that fighting spirit.’’

After 11 months, the man who knocked Hickford from his bike, Harry Simon McArthur, admitted responsibility for the accident, waiting until a trial on January 19 this year before changing his plea to a charge of careless driving causing injury to guilty.

He was sentenced to 200 hours’ community work, banned from driving for 10 months and ordered to pay the victim $30,000 by Judge Dominic Flatley of the Dunedin District Court. McArthur later appealed the sentence, with the verdict of that appeal due this week.

While McArthur eventually pleaded guilty, Hickford says it brought no restitution to himself and his family.

He hasn’t expressed these feelings to McArthur, in person or through a lawyer, and says he wouldn’t really ever want to because it wouldn’t be a friendly exchange.

‘‘His actions to date gives us the impression he has no remorse about what has happened.’’

However, he did sit in on the ‘‘minute and a half’’ trial in January.

‘‘The fact that he’s now appealed the sentence that’s been given to him, that’s been another knock in the head for me. Whatever punishment they give him, it’s not enough. It doesn’t equal what punishment he’s given to me.’’