A Miracle and a Prayer

I have been thinking about writing about this for a while; but as is the case with most of what I write it comes in stages through mediation, walking out in nature, and through synchronicities. I have had a couple of nudges in the last several days towards putting what happened to paper. Today, I turned on Oprah to get the third time is a charm nudge. She had on her program an NFL player who had been injured and could have possibly never walked again.

Almost twenty years ago, I was with my husband, daughter, and in-laws on a vacation at Myrtle Beach. On one day I was running along the beach, as those were my jogging days. On the next day, while sitting at a light to turn into a pancake house, we were rear-ended. There were some lucky things about the accident. I say lucky, because I took the brunt of the impact. My daughter, still very young, was in the back seat with me. Being small, she just bounced a little. Another lucky thing was that the Bronco we were in had a steel bumper. Possibly, the unlucky thing was that was the day before harness seat belts were in the back seat; so with an impact a good portion of your body would still erupt forward, which mine did. Another good thing was that no one else in either vehicle was hurt.

The first feeling was extreme neck pain. I became very uncomfortable probably due to the pain and found it difficult to breath. There was the ambulance ride to the hospital, the only one I've ever had being a patient. I remember feeling every movement of the stretcher.

The rest seems almost like a dream state. Parts seemed surreal; and yet there was fuzz like haze around me. The doctor was asking if I could feel my legs. I really had no idea what was happening. I wondered why he was asking about my legs when my neck was hurt. They did have a neck brace on me. I responded that yes I could feel my legs; they were only numb. He was obviously doing things that I couldn't feel at all.

Now, part of the family was gathered at the hospital. My sister-in-law and her husband had taken our daughter to the mall to distract her. I saw my mother-in-law in tears; and my husband was in even worse shape. I overheard the diagnosis of me being a paraplegic. Maybe they thought I was too out of it to comprehend. X-rays were being examined and I think I was a lone for a brief period of time. There could have been medical staff there, but not within my range of vision, as the brace limited my view. This was when the miracle occurred.

As, I lay in wait, with my family all torn up in the waiting area, my life more or less flashed in my mind's eye. At the very least I reviewed my immediate circumstances. My marriage was less than ideal. As I lay on my back I perused my condition, more than just the injury itself. In a very short span of time I went from a dark night of the soul to a new dawn. My first thought was about my less than ideal marriage. I pictured myself in a wheelchair and how my husband would have to take care of me, thinking it would serve him right. This is a shameful admittance, but never the less the truth. Then other thoughts rushed in. I thought about my daughter and how I didn't want this for her. Suddenly, I thought I have a choice of two paths. It is my decision which one to take. I cannot even put into words the determination that came from within. I have also likened that moment to when in the first Superman movie, he was so distraught over the death of Lois Lane that he flew around earth causing it to spin backwards in order to free her from death. The prayer I prayed at that moment had the same intensity, a big bang all from some place deep inside of me.

The doctor returned to the room. He removed the neck brace. He said it wasn't as bad as they had thought, with the warning that if I ever take a blow to that spot in my neck again that I would be a goner. I tended to ignore that, as what else can you do.

I must follow with that things were never quite the same with my neck. There was intermittent pain for about a year afterwards. I couldn't return to running due to the jarring sensation to my neck. It took a year to even get to the point where I could turn around in bed without using my arms for support. It took years before the bones quit popping with each turn. That disappeared when I finally worked through it with yoga. Everything considered these were minor and something I tried to keep to myself. I have always been a strong believer in prayer and mind over matter. I think I was practicing the law of attraction before I knew of its existence. Don't give attention to something if you don't want it to grow.

Now, there is only a slight crunch that I can only hear when I move my neck. At least I hope I am the only one who hears it.

Instead of running, I began walking and then hiking. I often think and give thanks that I am walking. When I feel myself getting lazy and wanting to for go exercise, nine times out of ten, (I won't say I'm always perfect about this) I make myself get up and get moving, considering the ability to walk a blessing.

Comments: 22

Vivian P. Jan 31, 2008, 5:54pm EST

wonderful story Amen

A Miracle and a Prayer

Comments: 22

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