Freak accident: Girl escapes death after fracturing skull on tree

HOUSTON – A girl is recovering after a freak accident left her with severe head injuries.

Last Friday, Zoe Baldwyn was running toward her grandmother's house in Conroe when she ran into a tree and fell backward, hitting her head on a knot of the tree's root system.

The accident left the 6-year-old with two skull fractures and a laceration in her brain.

She was flown to Children's Memorial Hermann Hospital, where her mother and father remained at her side for days.

"As parents, you do everything in your power to protect your kids, to make sure they don't get hurt, and this is one thing that's completely out of our control, and it bothers us. It bothers us a lot," Zoe's mother, Alexis Nicole Anderson, said. "If it wasn't for everyone who responded to my daughter, I'd be burying my child."

Zoe's recovery has been miraculous. She's now alert and talking and able to eat solid food.

"Today she was saying she felt good, she wasn't in pain," Zoe's father, Wesley Huseby, said.

On Thursday, Zoe's parents got the chance to thank their daughter's doctor. The doctor deflected, instead praising the girl's parents for bringing her to the hospital quickly.

Dr. Stephen Fletcher said Zoe is lucky to be alive.

"A huge tree limb lacerated her scalp ... pretty much broke the side of her skull in multiple fragments ... she had multiple fragments in the brain," Fletcher said.

Zoe has a long recovery ahead. She needs therapy and more surgeries, but she's already come a long way from the brink of death.

Zoe's parents are hoping to move the girl to Shriners Hospital as soon as Friday to begin physical therapy.