NEWS PHOTO JAMES TUBB
Medicine Hat Tigers forward Brayden Boehm looks to make a pass in the Moose Jaw end during the first period of a 6-3 win over the Warriors on Dec. 10 at Co-op Place.
jtubb@medicinehatnews.com@ReporterTubb
Most hockey players’ favourite sounds are skates on a fresh sheet of ice or a puck clanging off the cross bar before dropping into the net. One of Brayden Boehm’s favourite sounds is the reassuring tick of the mechanical valves in his dad Dave’s heart.
The 18-year-old Medicine Hat Tigers forward’s dad had heart surgery on Dec. 18, 2021 to install the valves after his weren’t functioning properly. Only three days later, his sister Hailey, who has scoliosis and Scheuermanns disease, had surgery on her spine. Five years prior, at the age of 13, she also had surgery on her heart.
Looking back a year later, Boehm says it was a hard time for him being in Medicine Hat while his family was going through these procedures back in his home in Nanaimo, B.C., but says he had support.
“It definitely sucks, especially when things happen and you can’t be there to support them and you’re only available over the phone,” Boehm said. “I had a therapist here for a while who really helped me out, she was awesome and she helped me get through it. My parents were super supportive for me when I asked things they helped me out with stuff like that. They’re always there to talk.”
Boehm scored a goal on the day his dad had heart surgery, a wrist shot that snuck through Lethbridge goaltender Bryan Thomson in a 5-3 Hurricanes win, in the Tigers’ final game before their Holiday break.
Not that he would ever forget what his dad and sister have been through, Boehm got a tattoo this summer of a heart and a spine with the dates of their surgeries inside as a reminder. He says he got it from a shop near his house and it was a “long two hours” in the chair. It took some time to convince his mom Tracy it was OK, with the final result doing all the work.
“My mom wasn’t fully (on board), she was happy with it, she liked the look and really liked how it came out, she’s just not very big on tattoos,” Boehm said. “But my dad got a similar one and my sister got one kind of similar as well. So it’s the three of us inked up.”
Boehm says both his dad and sister are doing fine and Hailey is in her first year of classes at the University of Calgary, where she is “studying and complaining all about it.” He says he doesn’t know her exact major but says she is planning on doing something related to her own heart conditions. She was in the crowd when the Tigers took on the Calgary Hitmen on Nov. 4, a 5-1 Medicine Hat loss.
The soon to be 19-year-old says he is on the phone every couple of days back home checking in with his parents and his younger brother Nash, who quickly became an only child with his two siblings both in Alberta.
“Every two nights I’ll FaceTime my younger brother, with sister’s at university now and I’m gone, it’s been a rough couple of months for him kind of being alone, “Boehm said “Obviously he’s trying to figure stuff out too.”
This year’s Christmas break was a more welcomed one for Boehm, no relative was recovering from surgery with the main focus of the family on who will win the next card game. They will play multiple games around the dinner table, from hand and foot canasta, farmers Rummi, Rummi 2000 and President. When it comes to luck games, Boehm says his brother usually wins and his dad gets competitive and is often the winner in other games but the results don’t matter to him, he’s just glad to have his family.
“It all definitely makes you realize you have to make the time you have now and not regret anything,” Boehm said. “So I spend as much time as I can whether it be playing cards for a couple hours or family dinners, just putting a smile on your face.
“Realizing that it can all be gone in a heartbeat and that you can’t take anything for granted.”
