Although injuries steal his childhood, P.J. Allen takes it in stride

By Sarah Molina

Published: April 17, 2005

P.J. Allen lets his cousin Paris Harris, 15, braid his hair. P.J. Allen wants to be an engineer some day.

"I like to take things apart and put them back together," he said in his soft voice through deep, heavy breaths. It's no surprise he feels that way. When he was 2 years old, the heat from the bombing fused his lungs. He's spent much of the 10 years being put back together.

Now he's ready to pick up his childhood.

Of course, that's tough for a kid who has appeared on "The Oprah Winfrey Show" and who is a pen pal with Sarah Ferguson -- she sent him an Easter basket this year.

P.J. takes it all in stride.

"I'm just kind of used to it. It's been fun. I got to do things other kids didn't get to do."

P.J. is more interested in being a normal kid.

A limited ability with love of sports
P.J. loves playing basketball even if he can only play in six-minute increments. To play hoops and his other love, baseball, he uses an inhaler. But sometimes the wind, dust and running are still too much for his damaged lungs.

P.J. says he doesn't remember the bombing, but he's reminded of it every day as he goes through daily breathing treatments.

P.J. survived with burns on 55 percent of his body, a broken arm, a badly damaged ear drum and scrapes and bruises on his head. He stayed in the hospital for 65 days.

Until he was 5, he had nightmares he was on fire.

He grows his hair long to cover the scars on his head. His trachea tube, which helped him breathe for almost nine years, was removed Jan. 6, 2004, at a Cincinnati hospital.

He has never visited the Oklahoma City National Memorial Museum. P.J.'s grandmother Deloris Watson said she doesn't want the nightmares to return.

"He knows he was in the bombing," she said. "When he was younger, he really didn't understand the magnitude of what that really meant ... But the older he gets, the more knowledgeable he becomes."

P.J. only recently started attending classes at a "regular" school. For fear he might become ill from other children, he was taught at home until the fourth grade by tutors from the Oklahoma City Public School District.

Watson then enrolled him at Stonegate Elementary School, although he attended no more than 45 days during the school year because of additional trips to Ohio. The hole from his trachea tube was not closing properly.

P.J. is enrolled at Knowledge is Power Program (KIPP) Reach College Preparatory School in Oklahoma City. His attendance is perfect and grades are good, but social skills most kids learn early in schooling give him trouble.

"It's been a big adjustment for P.J.," she said. "There's so many things he didn't have a clue -- standing in line and not talking out. His academics are good."

He attends classes from 7:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. five days a week and every other Saturday.

Watson said she chose the school for its strict academic regimen. There is no recess.

"I didn't have to worry about him running around on the playground, rough housing," she said.

The school also does not allow teasing, she said.

"I didn't want things that he had no control over to be a source of ridicule and distract him from his academics," Watson said.

In search of a normal childhood
Watson said she has learned a lot in the last 10 years watching P.J. grow. She has learned not to be mad about what happened to her grandson but to concentrate on "getting him to where he is today."

She's proud of his goals and all that he's achieved. But her focus is on the present.

"You have to be a kid first," Watson said.

While in and out of hospitals, Watson supplemented P.J.'s tutoring by teaching him from any math and science books she could find.

"I wanted him to have as normal a childhood as he possibly could have," Watson said. "In spite of all that he's been through, he's just a kid wanting to be a kid," Watson said. "The bombing took so much from P.J., I don't want to take any more."

Whether it's his grandmother's guidance or the journey he's been on, P.J. is determined to work in engineering. Considering what he's already overcome, that achievement seems pretty small.