A Little History
Most people begin by telling some
tragic story about paralysis. The tragic part often happens after the injury.
During high school, I had a teacher who had been injured in Viet Nam. He taught marketing,
computer skills and much more about life. He was someone you could just sit around with
and kick the bull. Very rarely did he talk about what he'd been through but you just knew
it was a lot. When he did reflect back on those days it was kept very brief and it was
something you respected. Shortly after my accident, he said to me, "right now is the
easiest you'll ever have it." I had just received the biggest blow of my life and was
loosing everything and everyone around me. It seemed harsh at the time and I questioned
whether he'd gone over the edge or had no clue what I was going through. I was twenty and
had spent two years in college. Most of my time there was spent in the gym, being pretty
social, drinking and occasionally some class work. I was in the best shape of my life and
I had a great time. I lived a very physical life and this had all changed in seconds.
Before my injury, I was one of the fortunate ones with a good childhood, loving parents
and a couple of longstanding steady girlfriends (one after the other) that really shared
what it was like to love and to hurt. This had all changed. So how could he say something
so off the wall?
Four days before heading back to school for the fall term a very close friend Ray, had
invited me to Youngsville, PA along the Allegheny River in the Allegheny National Forest
for a canoe trip down the river. We had driven up to a little town just across the New
York state border for some guitar equipment and we grabbed a six pack for the trip. He had
lived right along the river most of his life and knew the area well. We paddled down the
river a few miles and someone had set up a rope swing. The banks were steep. A series of
three railroad ties were stacked end to end with thin wooden blocks nailed to one side for
a makeshift ladder and a small platform at the top capped off the launching pad for about
what seemed to be 20+ feet off the water. Ray grabbed the rope, climbed to the top and
swung away. As soon as the rope retreated back to the bank, I threw it up behind the
platform, climbed to the top and kicked off. Feet first first time. (Heard that one
before?) Well I did! It was an incredible rush. Ray went up another time and launched
himself way out in the water. I had noticed another canoe coming down the river. As cool
as it was to be doing what we were doing, its always better to be showing off while doing
it! I gripped the rope tight and kicked my legs straight out and gained a lot of air fast.
Tucking my knees up in my chest to spin into a few flips, something wasn't right. I lost
my bearings and landed head first. That's the last I remembered.
Ray waited for me to surface but began to panic when I didn't. He climbed back up the
platform to get a better view and began yelling to the people in the other canoe for help.
I had been under for a while before they spotted me below the water. I was drug to the
shore unconscious and not breathing with a serious head wound. The guy in the other canoe
had been studying medicine and knew life saving skills as did Ray. They sent his
girlfriend for help while they tried to get me stable. She was able to find a phone and an
ambulance and rescue crews were dispatched to each side of the river to find the best
extraction. The only way out was to get back in the canoe and travel back across the river
to a more shallow bank. It was there that I was diagnosed with a severe spinal injury and
scalp laceration. My situation was grim.They called in Life Flight. The helicopter pulled
me from the woods and carried me to a hospital several miles away. I remember only two
events after I struck bottom. The girl I had been dating gave me gold necklace months
before. I asked Ray to take it off and keep it until I got out of the hospital. I was
aware I had been hurt but had no clue how bad. The other moment I recall was being loaded
into the rear of the helicopter before waking up to the bright lights of an ICU room in
the hospital.
The clinical definition was C6 complete compression fracture causing
quadriplegia. If you view a spinal level chart, it will plot out the sensory nerve active
points. Above the C6 lines I have true sensation. Below the line I don't have real
sensation. One characteristic of paralysis that seems to be relatively unknown by the
general public is that your body sends you signals all the time. Being paralyzed is not
entirely like being numb. Since nerves are damaged in the central nervous system, our
bodies find different ways of telling us pain, pleasure and an array of weird sensations.
My high school teacher was right. After the get well cards, casseroles, constant
visitation and newness wears off, life goes on and its up to you to live it. That means
physically, financially and socially. There is only one person responsible for you and you
have to wear that hat. When things are so different and activity is all around you early
on after the injury, you don't have much time to plot out a future. Day to day adjustment
is pretty damn important and it can consume all of your time. A little later, this does
ease up and you're faced with planning a further down the road. In this situation, people
generally follow certain paths. In some of the public speaking I've done, I use an
exercise to help make my point. I ask the group to clap. This is something we learn very
early in life and use as a form of expression. Its a way we participate socially. Then I
request them to hold one arm to their side. Now clap for me again. The group has been
forced to make a decision and step outside of doing something the only way they've ever
known. Some just figure out what to do, others look around and see who's doing what, some
just wait or choose not to participate. This is no different than any struggle we face
disabled or not. You can forge ahead and smack the desk, work together and give each other
a high-five, witness others doing it and learn from them or again choose not to
participate. We all vary between the stages and the task at hand determines the course of
action. The things I've done and the places I've been could have never happened without
wanting to live, being interdependent rather than independent and accepting help when its
necessary. Never has the desire to quit the game been the answer.
I learned early on that we should never feel lucky
because someone else has it worse than us. I feel that there is far more inspiration
found in people that have
great struggles in life yet they seem to accomplish more, survive better and live
happier.
Read on in some of my Stories...
A Little History |
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