Anyone who knows me may also know that I am not one to post often on Facebook. Frankly, its rare that I have something that I want to say to everyone that I know. Tonight is different. On an rainy Friday night like this one exactly one year ago, at 7:45pm, I nearly lost my life. While pulling into an intersection, a car traveling 55mph struck my drivers side door. The accident pushed my drivers door into the center console and I was pinned inside the car barely conscious. Amazingly there was a fire station 300 yards away from the scene of the accident and within minutes, fire fighters were cutting the roof off my car and pulling me out. I was taken to Shock Trauma where I received emergency surgery to fix the tear in my aorta valve which was causing me to bleed out internally. My left leg was badly broken, my pelvis fractured on both sides, ribs and vertebrate were broken,my left lung was collapsed and my right lung was operating at 30% and my kidneys had failed. After successful surgery to my heart where I received a stint and my leg where I revived a titanium rod, I awoke on Sunday morning to excruciating pain and an intubation tube breathing for me as my body would not breath on its own. With Paige and my parents in the room, I communicated all day with a dry erase board. The doctors did tests and determined I was not paralyzed and that I did not appear to have brain damage. Sunday night the doctors pulled the tube from my throat and my body was able to breath with the help of supplemental oxygen through my nostrils. From that point, I spent 12 additional days at shock trauma. I first had to learn to breath on my own. If you have ever experienced not being able to breath on your own, I will tell you that its an amazing feeling when you are able to do so again. Next I needed to learn to urinate. With my kidneys badly damaged in the accident, this was a very painful process. This was also a triumphant moment and my 2nd major step on what would be a long climb up the hill. After 8 days, it was time for me to stand -- a task that my mangled body thought impossible but I did it. On day 11 I took my first steps with the assistance of a walker. My dad was kind enough to bring in two awesome yellow tennis balls with custom cuts to place on the walker legs similar to what my grandmother had rocked on her walker in the 90s :-) Eventually, I was released from shock trauma and spent several days in rehab learning to put together multiple steps with a walker. If you have ever been unable to walk, you would know how amazing it feels to put together a few steps in a row. I was released and back home with my AMAZING wife and two children (1 & 3 at the time) on December 19th and it was one of the best days of my life. The road to full recovery has been long and continues today as I am about to walk into the gym for a 8:30pm workout with a concentration on my left leg. My goal is to ride my bike across the state of Colorado this June and complete 600 miles in 7 days just like I did in June of 2013 before the accident. Today I found a reminder in my iPhone that I had typed in my calendar on day 5 when I was laying in the hospital bed. I had completely forgot until I saw it today. The message said its been 1 year, brush yourself off. After reading this message, I decided to write this Facebook message to everyone. In life we all have bad years, bad weeks, bad days, and sometimes a real shitty Friday night. We must always remember to first Pick Yourself Up. Sometimes its harder that other times but we must always get up. Next, you have to brush yourself off. At times, there is a lot of dirt and it takes a while to brush it all off and forget about it BUT you must push it aside and move on. I believe I am the same person but I do look at life differently. There are things that matter and things that really dont. I think we can all pretty quickly decipher between the two. Next time you find yourself upset, down, or ticked off about something that is not important, first appreciate that you can breathe. Next appreciate that you can take a piss. Finally, appreciate that you can stand up and that you can walk with your own two feet. Then get up, brush yourself off and get busy living!
Posted on: Sat, 06 Dec 2014 01:33:13 +0000
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