Rodeo star Spencer Wright’s wife said being briefly away moments before their 3-year-old son Levi drowned on their Utah property “will haunt me for the rest of my life.”
“At that moment he was my responsibility alone,” Callie Wright wrote in a Facebook post on Thursday, days after Levi was taken off life support.
“Whether I went back to check on my sleeping baby, change laundry, wash a bottle, or stock up on lunch, I honestly don’t know,” she wrote. “Whatever it was, it was never more important than following through on that day.”
Levi was driving his toy tractor on the family’s 24-acre property in Utah on May 21 when he drove his vehicle into a creek. Rescuers found him unresponsive about a mile downstream.
Days after the accident, the child opened his eyes, but never regained consciousness after suffering a serious brain injury. He died on June 2 after his parents decided to withdraw life-sustaining treatment.
Wright said in her post on Thursday that her children rode their bikes, toys and walked across the creek “a million times.” She wrote that water passes through the creek only for a short time during the year.
“Unless you were in my house, it’s hard to paint a picture of how something like this could happen,” she said, sharing a video showing her family on horses crossing the water. “There is a creek that runs through our 24 acre property that separates our house from Grandma and Grandpa’s house, and through that creek is a road made of concrete. This is how we got to their house safely most days since our dirt road is sometimes a race track Nascar.”
Levy didn’t do “anything he hadn’t done before, but this time the water was at its peak and strong enough to push his tractor off the road and into the creek as it passed,” she said.
Wright said her son asked her if he could ride his toy tractor. She told him that Grandma wasn’t home, and she couldn’t drive across the creek and stay near their house.
“As he drove away, I ran back into the house. This is a decision that will haunt me for the rest of my life,” she said.
Wright ended her post with two Bible verses and said she prays that anyone who judges her or uses harsh words will never face her nightmare.
“Although I am a firm believer that our stories are written long before we come to this earth and that our Lord will take us when He is ready, I will lose sleep over this forever but I know 3 things that are true. 1 “I am not a perfect mother but I am a good mother . 2. My little boy loved me with everything he had. 3. Never say never because it only takes seconds and it can happen to you too.”
Family friend and spokesperson Mindy Sue Clark came to Wright’s defense. Posted on Facebook That the creek is dry “nearly 90% of the year, and there are about 10 days or so with runoff in the spring until it fills up.”
Clarke described Callie and Spencer as “the most amazing parents” and said that they were “put on this earth to have children.”
“This is an accident that could happen to anyone at any time,” she said. “Now there’s a mother with one less child to put to sleep at night, and people who want to rub salt in that wound. These people are a special kind of evil and cruel. And as Callie said, none of us hope you’ll ever be on the receiving end, to those who have been a light, Please continue to lift my friends up in prayer.”
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