This week’s Kid Captain is full of life, and will bring the positivity to Kinnick.

By Katelyn Weisbrod

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A 7-year-old who lights up every room he walks into will soon light up Kinnick Stadium.

Konner Guyer from Eddyville, Iowa, is this week’s Kid Captain, a program that features kids undergoing treatment at the University of Iowa Children’s Hospital at Iowa football games. At Saturday’s Iowa vs. Northwestern game, Konner will get to hang out on the field alongside the Hawkeyes for the national anthem.

Konner gets around in a wheelchair, and he is learning to walk with assistance. He has quadriplegic cerebral palsy, chronic lung disease, and has had 18 surgeries in his lifetime.

Konner was born in November 2008 as a twin at 28 weeks, weighing 2 pounds, 3 ounces. Konner’s twin brother, Kolby, weighed just 1 pound, 3 ounces and died at 6 days old. The babies suffered from twin-to-twin transfusion syndrome while in the womb — a rare condition in which the babies share a placenta, and blood flows unevenly between them.

At 2 weeks old, Konner had dangerous brain bleeding, and he was transported from Des Moines to the Children’s Hospital. On the ambulance ride, paramedics lost and resuscitated Konner 21 times.

His mother, Tanya Tilley, finally brought her baby home from the hospital when he was 4 months old, still attached to oxygen and an apnea monitor. In his first two years, Konner could not digest food properly and had to sleep upright in a chair with his mother in case he got sick.

“He’s a very sick little boy,” Tilley said. “But he does basically everything that any other kid does. He’s on a baseball team, he likes to go bowling, he loves to swim in the hot tub.”

Despite all his health issues, Konner is full of passion. Tilley said he loves sports, art, music, and playing with Legos. When he grows up, Tilley said, Konner wants to be a doctor to help other people with cerebral palsy.

“Just because he’s in a wheelchair doesn’t mean he’s slowed down,” she said. “I don’t see him sitting in a wheelchair doing nothing the rest of his life; I don’t see that at all.”

Konner has been counting down the days until he gets to be the Kid Captain on Saturday.

“He’s not been sleeping at night,” Tilley said. “His para and I write notes back and forth, and she said his focus has been off, he’s a little distracted so he can’t stop talking about his football game. This is a huge opportunity for him.”

Konner’s para Tiffany McCain, who assists him at school, said he is outgoing and curious.

“He loves to question people. When he meets a stranger he’s always got an arsenal of questions as soon as they say, ‘Hi,’ ” McCain said.

His occupational therapist since he was 10 months old, Elise Spronk, said he has a real focus on others, especially other kids with disabilities.

“He doesn’t have a ‘woe is me’ attitude; he has a great attitude about his situation and still thinking about others,” Spronk said. “Once you meet him, you’ll fall in love with him.”