"Will you walk again?"

This is something I get asked a lot. Honestly, it's much more than a simple "yes." Or "no." answer. There's a lot that goes behind it. I hate typing paragraphs to people, so here's it laid out for everyone. :)

The damage done to my spinal cord is what caused the loss of my lower half (by that I mean being paralyzed) My back snapped at t12. The t12 vertebrae shot itself into my spinal cord, acting similar to a knife, and almost cut my spinal cord in half. If my spinal cord would have been cut in half, my chances of walking would be zero. It HAS happened before where "complete" spinal cord injuries (sci) have gained back movement in their lower half. With me being listed as an "incomplete" gives me more of an open door to have the chance of walking again.. However, my spinal cord was only severely damaged. The doctor who performed my back surgery told my parents my chances of walking again would be slim. He added that because I am so young (19 at the time of my accident) it could happen if I worked for it.

Also, the trauma my body went through during my accident (rolling a blazer at speeds of 65+) left a lot of swelling on my spinal cord. This swelling could take up for one year to go down and be back to normal again. Nobody can really say right now if I'll walk again because its a waiting game. The swelling could go down and I get full movement and feeling back, but I may never get movement or feeling back. I've also heard stories where one or the other came back. Spinal cord injuries vary among people (just like every injury) so I can't say for sure anything. Most people with sci DO recover, but there's still some who won't.

At the current time, I've had toe movement in both my feet and moving of my whole right foot. None of it is extreme and most of it is uncontrolled, but I thank God for the movement because its a good sign.

Do I think I'll walk again? Of course I do! I keep it in my head every day that this is just for a small time. I know if God wanted me to walk, I could get up right now and run a marathon (I hope God doesn't ask me to run one though. I'm so out of shape!) even if the doctors said there was no way I'd ever stand again, I know God is much bigger than they are and I know He has a plan for me. If God calls me to never walk another step in my life, I'll take it as a blessing and praise His name. God sees the bigger picture & no matter how badly I want to walk again, I won't be down on myself if God doesn't allow it. He always says that I don't need to worry, He has things under control. So even though being patient was never something I was good at, I will wait and put my full trust in my Father.

If you have questions about spinal cord injuries or anything else about my accident, always email me. I am totally an open book to talk about my accident. I don't take offense to anything.

I really encourage you all to educate yourself on spinal cord injuries. It's MUCH more than just not being able to walk. There's a graph i posted on facebook that has percentages of how sci happen. The largest group there is car accident.(39%) That could be any of you. Always take driving seriously, because I didn't and it landed me on the graph.