In the driver's seat

Nearly three years after a catastrophic spinal cord injury during a Barlow High ski team practice, Kip Johnson is reclaiming his life – one muscle at at time

By Kari Hastings

The Gresham Outlook, Aug 18, 2006, Updated Oct 30, 2009

John Klicker / The Gresham Outlook

Kip works with lead trainer J.J. Fowler at the Beaverton location of Project Walk on Monday, Aug. 14. Project Walk works on the premise that if you give the body the right stimulus, it can heal itself. Project Walk opened its second location in Beaverton in June.

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Kip Johnson wheels into Project Walk’s “gym for quads” on a Monday mid-afternoon. His trademark stoic look sets on his face, and his baby blue eyes take on a glint of steel.

He’s ready to work.

Trainers J.J. Fowler and Jerod Warf greet him with big smiles and immediately hoist Kip out of his wheelchair and onto a table.

Jewish rapper Matisyahu is pumping from the stereo: “Got the freedom to choose, You better make the right move, Young man, the power’s in your hand.” Fowler works Kip’s arms and legs on the table, then carries him to the floor mats.

Kip flexes every muscle available to him to execute a half push-up. Slowly, his torso rises, his back slightly bowed. His arms and shoulders quiver. Kip doesn’t make a sound, just keeps pushing. Fighting for every centimeter.

Ever since a ski accident in December 2003 put Kip in a wheelchair and doctors told him he had zero chance of walking again, Kip has spent every day working to get out of the chair.

Project Walk is a controversial approach to some, but to Kip and the Johnson family, it’s the only approach that makes sense.

At Project Walk, which in June opened its second location in Beaverton, the mindset is present in everything they do and say.

“This is a really exciting phase for Kip,” Fowler says. “He’s starting to put on muscle mass. The idea is to maintain the freedom he has and get him more freedom.”

The family had been flying him down to Carlsbad, Calif., where Project Walk began, at huge expense, to spend weeks at a time. Paraplegics and quadriplegics from around the world migrate to the center following spinal cord injuries.

The Beaverton Project Walk has been a “huge blessing” for the Johnson family, says Kip’s mother, Lisa. Instead of relying on friends’ vacation condos and paying for flights, Lisa drives Kip across town from their Gresham home three times a week for Kip’s two-hour workouts.

“What we believe is that when given the stimulus, the body can heal itself,” says Fowler, who moved his family to Beaverton to run the facility off Allen Boulevard. “We are forcing a new system to grow.”

As Kip completes push-ups, Lisa comments that his back used to be far more swayed. His injury left him with no movement below his shoulders and partial arm movement – just biceps and wrist extenders.

His stomach is tightening up, receding from what Lisa calls a “quad belly,” a distended stomach that results from a lack of control over the abdominal muscle wall.

At Project Walk, Kip works with whatever he can.

“We’ll take anything,” Fowler says. “We’ll beg, cheat, steal and borrow, use whatever he can to create the movement. And Kip’s doing great. When I got to Portland, I was amazed. I hadn’t seen him since January.”

Kip, 21, is driving now, consoling himself about his soccer mom minivan with the fact that he’s got “black windows and nice wheels.”

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