Tim Rau said more than once that the debilitating neuro degenerative disease he had “is not going to take me away.”
And it didn’t. Rau, of Fraser, who used a wheelchair to get around, died July 4 in a rafting accident on the Colorado River near Moab. He was 17.
Rafting was only one of the sports Rau participated in after being diagnosed with the illness at age 10.
“He was amazing, and he never complained or talked about his illness,” said Martine Pearson of Granby, a paraprofessional who helped him do school work at Middle Park High School. “He focused on graduating from high school,” Pearson said.
“I never met anyone like him,” said Pearson, who helped Rau with reading and eating lunch as the disease took away his ability to perform either task. “But he had a 3.8 grade average and took college algebra last year,” she said. “He never gave up.”
He was hoping to go to college and become a graphic artist.
“He was an incredible kid who made a difference and always thought he could make things work,” said his mother, Diana Lynn Rau.
Late in his life, Rau began suffering intermittent tremors, “and that upset him,” said Pearson.
Rau, his mother and Trey Hegstrom were in a raft when it capsized. They both tried to grab Tim Rau, as did his father, Charlie Rau, who was in another raft with other people.
Finally, a passing kayaker grabbed him. While waiting for a medical helicopter, friends and family tried to save Tim.
“I never gave up with mouth-to-mouth resuscitation,” said Diana Rau. “His color returned, but his heart never restarted,” she said. “I could hear the water sloshing in his lungs.”
The helicopter took him to St. Mary’s Hospital in Grand Junction.
Timothy Rau was born in Denver on June 21, 1992.
He played baseball, soccer and volleyball, skied, climbed, and ran track. In 2007, he did a modified version of the Iditarod sled-dog race in Anchorage, Alaska.
The first symptoms of his illness, called ataxia telangiectasia, were loss of balance and speech problems. Eventually, he employed a red electric scooter and then a wheelchair, though he tried to walk on his own for as long as possible.
Friends at school “were awesome” in helping her son when he needed help, his mother said. About 500 people came to a candlelight vigil that was held for Rau.
He and his parents were determined that Tim Rau would be as independent as possible, even telling school friends to let him pick himself up if he overturned his scooter, said his mother. He delighted in beeping his scooter horn at kids in the hallways.
At 6-feet-3 and 190 pounds, Tim “was strong as an ox” and could still row, his mother said.
In addition to his parents, Rau is survived by a grandmother, Kathryn Jane Yingling of Hagerstown, Md.
Virginia Culver: 303-954-1223 or vculver@denverpost.com
