Boy learns to live with BB in his brain

OK, so maybe no one shot anyone's eye out. But 12-year-old Tommy Gallagher now lives with a bullet lodged in his brain after his little brother, Jamie, shot him with a BB gun. 

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Tommy feels OK now, but the Tampa, Fla., seventh grader has lost full control of his left leg and arm since the accident, when the BB bullet went through his eye (his eye!) and ended up in the right side of his brain. When the boys' mother, Janice Gallagher, found the two after it happened, the younger boy was horrified over what he'd accidentally done to his big brother, tearfully telling his mom, "I'm so sorry, break my guns, put me in time out!"

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At first, Gallagher thought the bullet must have bounced off Tommy's face -- until the boy couldn't move his left arm or leg, and the family visited the St. Joseph's emergency room. There, the neurosurgeon told them there was a bullet in the boy's brain -- and that there was no way to safely operate and remove the bullet, so there the BB would stay.

Tommy faces months of rehab, but recently, he was able to move his left arm. His mother says, "We're just grateful that he's alive. we've thrown out the guns. it's gone. so, that's my message."