“Yeah, I know I had an accident! What the hell are you doing here? You’re not supposed to be here!” I’d said that because I thought I was still in Baghdad.
Mom talked fast to cut me off and calm me down. “No, no, no. It’s seven days later, and you’re in Washington, D.C., at Walter Reed.”
I blinked. “What?” It took a few seconds for it all to sink in. “Wait a second—I’m in the United States?” Mom nodded. “You mean I don’t have to sit through a seventeen-hour flight home?” I was so relieved that I almost laughed. “That’s awesome.”
I was all drugged up, so it really was a blur, but I knew I was home, and I was alive.
While I was still confined to a bed and even before I’d started my rehab, my mom said to me, “You know you have basically two options here, right?”
I said, “Yup—move on, or roll over and die.”
She looked me in the eye and said, “And you’re gonna . . . ?”
“I’m movin’ on,” I said, surprised she even had to ask the question.
My mom told me that when she had received “the phone call” from the Army, she had started crying and looking at my dad, Jim, and my younger sister, Briana, but she had been unable to speak and tell them why. Whoever had called had told Mom exactly what had happened to me, but when she had tried to explain it to my dad and my sister, she couldn’t. She’d started making a chopping motion with her hand against her thigh.
She simply couldn’t say the words.
My dad grabbed the phone and took over the conversation. After it was done, he had to call everyone—our family and friends—to break the news, because Mom just couldn’t talk about it. It was as if the news had cut her heart out.
That changed when she and my family got to Walter Reed.
They were all there when I arrived—my mom, my dad, my brother and sister. The first time they saw me, I was still unconscious. I know they cried when they saw what had happened to me, but I never heard it, and that was because of my mom. She made everybody promise, including herself, that no one would ever cry in front of me.
“Stay strong,” she said to them. “If you need to cry, leave the room.” She knew I was going to have a hard time in the months to come, and she wanted nothing but positive energy around me. The last thing I was going to need was an excuse to give in to self-pity.
My brother and sister stuck around for the first couple of weeks, which was as long as they possibly could before having to go home and get back to work and school. My dad was with me for four months. His coworkers had all pulled together to donate time off for him to stay that long. It was a huge deal for me, because I really needed him there with me. But my mom—she gave up her job and lived with me the entire time I was at Walter Reed—thirteen months.
At first, they all took shifts because I was in the ICU and it was touch and go at first. My mom and whoever else was in town at any given moment—aunts, uncles, cousins—were at my bedside during the day.
Night was the hardest time for me, though. I never wanted to be alone at night, because I wasn’t sleeping very well. To make sure I had company, my dad or my brother slept during the day and sat up with me through the night. Someone had to stay awake because I always had some kind of problem—I was too hot, or I was too cold, or I’d want to shift position but couldn’t move. So my dad or Bobby was there to wipe the sweat from my face, or fix my blankets, or do whatever was necessary to make me as comfortable as I could be.
My mom made a point of handling all the paperwork that came with my stay at Walter Reed. Thanks to her, I don’t think I ever had to fill out a single form. All I ever had to do was scribble my signature a few times when she put a piece of paper in front of me.
Mom also took care of getting me whatever I needed, whether it was little things like cigs or Pepsi, or big things, like doing all the stupid paperwork and making sure I snagged the first available spot in the Malone House, which is like a hotel for long-term rehab patients at Walter Reed.
You see, the Malone House is always in demand. It’s better than being stuck in the hospital, and you get a private room. Its spaces get booked so quickly that a lot of people, if they aren’t lucky, end up at the Fisher House, which has less privacy because it’s communal living, or off campus at a regular hotel until a space opens up in Malone.
My mom wasn’t satisfied leaving our situation to luck. The moment she heard that someone was moving out of the Malone House, she finagled a way for that space to be assigned to me and her. She had us moved in there before anyone else knew the room was vacant.
We lived together in that shoe box of a room for the next year, sleeping on adjacent twin beds. She took care of me, cooked me dinner every night, and kept me company. But most of all, she kept me strong, emotionally speaking.
I started therapy each morning around eight or nine, and I usually got back to my room around three in the afternoon. My mom knew she didn’t need to be with me at every therapy session, so she didn’t go every day. But if I needed help, or if it was a day where something new or exciting was going to happen, at those times she was always there.
It was the rest of the time, the afternoons and evenings after therapy, when I needed her most. She kept me company so I didn’t go stir-crazy. We watched a lot of television together. Well, the truth is, I didn’t get into all the shows my mom liked to watch, so eventually I bought a small flat-screen TV and put it right next to the other set. There’d be nights she’d watch one show and I’d be sitting down next to her watching another show on the small set. So I guess technically we were watching TV togther.
The loss of movement from my injuries, the cramped room, the daily grind of physical therapy . . . it shrinks your whole world down to just a couple rooms and the same exercises over and over and over. My mom was my connection to the real world. She made sure I got out of the room and out to the mall, or anywhere outside, so that I’d remember there was more to life than our room and the rehab clinic.
Sometimes, when you’re dealing with something major, whatever it is—an illness, a relationship breakup, work problems, whatever—it’s easy for it to take over your whole life. It’s everything you do, talk about, and think about. Your world starts shrinking until that problem is all that’s left. Now, I’m not saying you should ignore your problems, not do the things you need to do. But you have to remember there’s so much more to life. There’s a great big world out there, and you want to be part of it. Laugh with your friends, spend time with your family. Just get out among people . . . even if it’s just going to the mall or sitting in the park watching kids play. Yeah, you may be dealing with some heavy stuff, but don’t let it take over your world.
My mom and I joked a lot, and we laughed a lot. That was important. Dealing with your own injuries, and being surrounded by others facing the same problems, can get you down; you can start to lose hope. It’s no different for anyone who’s had a setback and is struggling to recover. You have to keep your spirits up to go on fighting back toward a normal life. So Mom and I did things together. One time I bought an espresso machine, and we spent an evening trying to reinvent the caramel macchiato. Instead I blew the top off the machine and made a mess out of the whole room—and we both thought that was hysterical.
Another time, I ran my power chair smack into the wall.
Mom made a “tsk-tsk” sound and smiled. “Honey, you’re supposed to signal first.”
One night, we were lying in our beds and watching CSI on television. We used to watch that show a lot. During a commercial break, I said, “Mom! I could play one of those dead people! How cool would that be?”
She turned her head to look at me. “I don’t think I would enjoy seeing you like that, but you’re right—that would be cool. If you want to be a stuntman, you should. You can do anything you want. You just have to work hard, go for it, and see where it takes you.”
(A couple of years later, I went for it. And behold—I wasn’t just a dead body; I was a living, breathing mu
rder suspect on CSI: NY. Being there and playing that role was a profound moment for me. Standing on the set, I thought back to that moment in the Malone House, years earlier, when I had told my mom that I wanted to be on the show, and she was right there to tell me that I could.)
Mom’s faith in me made me believe there was no reason I couldn’t do anything. Thanks to her, instead of wasting time wondering what I can or can’t do, I spend my time thinking about what I do or don’t want to do.
Back then, though, I was still kind of sore—everything felt really raw. It’s not that I was in constant pain, but my body was a lot more sensitive than it was before or has been since. Even a simple bump or impact would hurt like hell. As a result, I wasn’t as quick to jump into action or try new things as I normally am.
I was also kinda raw emotionally. I had to relearn how to do everything. There were things my head knew how to do, but my body couldn’t. I’d get frustrated and angry. Sometimes I thought it would just be easier not to try.
My mom didn’t plan on letting me get used to sitting on my ass, though. She told me, “You need to keep moving. I know it hurts right now, but the more you work, the faster you’ll get used to it.” At first I didn’t believe her, but she kept telling me that, day after day. And you know what? Pretty soon it started to sink in. I began to get the message.
If someone tells you the same thing over and over and over again, after a while you’re going to start to believe it. If you surround yourself with positive people who push you to be your best, and who tell you everything will be all right, it can build you up and keep you going. But if you let yourself listen to people who fill your head with negativity, with pessimism, it won’t be long before you start thinking like they do.
The same thing applies to the things you say about yourself. If you call yourself an idiot, or a klutz, or say you’re not attractive, pretty soon you’ll start believing your own bad press. You owe yourself better treatment than that. Don’t put yourself down—there are more than enough jerks in the world who will be happy to do it for you. I’m not saying lie to yourself. I don’t want you to stand in front of a mirror mumbling, “I’m good enough, I’m smart enough, and gosh darn it, people like me.” I’m just saying give yourself a break once in a while. Don’t be so hard on yourself. Imagine a good friend of yours was in your position. What would you say to him? Would you criticize him? Knock him down? No, of course not. You’d encourage him, support him. Well, you deserve the same for yourself.
There were times I forgot to give myself that break, but my mom was there to do it for me. “Your life’s not over,” she told me. “You can do a lot of things. You’re going to get better and move on, and someday soon you’re going to do great things.” Because my mom kept saying this, not only did I start believing it, other people started believing it, too. It was like a snowball rolling down a mountain, getting bigger by the second, until it got so big and so obvious that you can’t stop it.
It became true.
Some people asked how I could put the explosion behind me and move on like that, with no self-pity. I told them I used to be a gymnast, and before that I played baseball; I was an athlete. What happens to an athlete when they get hurt? What do they do? They rehab their injuries, they work to get better, and then they get back in the game.
In my eyes, this was the same thing. My dreams hadn’t changed. My goals hadn’t changed. Who I was hadn’t changed. I got hurt, and I knew I needed to get myself back to the point where I could live on my own and go back to being who I knew I was. I needed to move on, so that’s what I told my body to do: Just get yourself back to good.
When I first started rehab—maybe for the first four weeks—I would go to therapy one or two hours a day. I’d do occupational therapy to learn how to use my new hand and then I’d do physical therapy to work on my range of motion, stretching, strength training—they were just trying to build me back up a little before they tried to get me walking.
My goal at first was to just get on prosthetics, to see how they felt, to see if I could walk. Once I got on them I was like, “Okay, I can do this.” My goal at that point was to find my limits, to push myself to the point where I would fall down. I swear, I must hold the record for falling down at Walter Reed.
My mentality was, “I may be fucked up now, but I’m gonna get better and get back to my life.” I just wanted to get this done so I could move on.
The hardest part of rehab—for me, at least—was to really accept what had happened to me, but I knew that it was the only way I’d ever be able to go forward.
During my time at Walter Reed, I noticed a major difference between the people who had accepted their circumstances and moved on and those who were still in denial. You could tell who was who based on which people were making steady progress in their rehab and which ones weren’t. There were people who were always complaining, making excuses, and just hating life, and they had a lot of trouble in therapy. And then there were others who were just doing it. I honestly believe that the difference was all about who had or hadn’t learned to live with what had happened to them.
I don’t think there was one moment when I magically went from struggling with acceptance to acceptance. I don’t even think you realize it until you’re there.
I know what helped me a lot was being around another triple amputee, Joey Bozik; seeing him walking and doing things made me think I could do it, too. But what also helped was small acts of confirmation that showed me I was getting better. I remember one time, I was in the gymnasium at Walter Reed and a couple of guys were throwing around a basketball, and I wondered if I could handle the ball and shoot like I used to. I was just outside the free-throw line and I grabbed the ball, threw it, and made the shot. At that moment, I thought if I could do this, just think what I could do if I really tried and practiced. Something as small as making that basket gave me hope and kept me moving forward, propelling me to my next accomplishment.
Bad things happen to us. It’s a fact of life. No one’s immune. Sooner or later, we all end up on the shit end of a stick. For me, it was getting blown up; for someone else, it might be losing a job, or a loved one dying, or a house burning down. There are things we can’t avoid, at least not forever. We can’t always control what happens to us. The only thing we can control is how we react to it. We can choose to lie down and die, or we can choose to go on living.
I’m not saying you can or should brush off everything life throws at you. There’s nothing wrong with grieving for the friends and family we lose, or with taking time to adjust to major life-changing events. But it’s not healthy to mourn forever. Life is meant to be lived forward, and you can’t do that if you spend all your time looking backward. You can carry some of that old stuff with you, but don’t let it slow you down. At some point you just have to get back on your feet and go. Walk if you have to, run if you can.
I started rehab as soon as I was able because I hate just lying around.
Now, I won’t bullshit you: learning to walk on prosthetic legs was a bitch. They felt unnatural to me. And, of course, you don’t really feel them, only against your thighs. It’s like trying to walk when your legs are asleep. Everyone knows how little control you have trying to walk on numb legs.
I couldn’t help but think of Lieutenant Dan Taylor, the soldier Gary Sinise played in Forrest Gump, who also lost both legs and finally got prosthetics. But I skipped over the troubles he had before making peace with his situation and went straight for the new legs. When I first started using “Lieutenant Dan” legs, I wanted to know what my limitations were and where my point of no return was. I needed to know how far I could go: How far can I lean back? How far can I bend forward? What happens if I stand on one foot? What if I get bumped?
To find out, I actually asked people to try to make me fall. I would close my eyes and say to my therapist, “Push me in some direction. Any way you want.” And she would either shove me backward or forward—not hard enough to knock me over, just a nudge
to make me need to correct my balance. When that happened, I’d clench anything I could get hold of and try to keep myself upright. One of the biggest things I had to learn was that my instincts in that case were wrong. I was fighting something natural, something I used to deal with without even thinking about it. What would normal people do in that situation? They would just take a step. I had to relearn that and teach my reflexes, Put your foot out! Take a step! If you’re falling left, step left! I needed to be more active and just push ahead. It’s the difference between slamming on the brakes and steering into a skid. You can go in the ditch or you can take control of the situation.
Sure, sometimes I fell. We all do. And I don’t just mean people with prosthetic legs. Every one of us falls sometimes, but that means we’re pushing ourselves, trying to increase our abilities. You know how people say they fell flat on their face when they’ve screwed up something they’re trying to do? Well, that’s what I was doing . . . literally. And that’s when I cooked up my motto: “If you’re not falling, you’re not trying.” Someone who never tries something new might not ever fall, but they sure aren’t going to do anything exciting either.
The first time I asked my physical therapist to try to push me over, she refused. I expected her response because it was only my first time on “shorties”—prosthetics just a few inches tall; you start on the shortest possible legs and work your way up as you learn how to control them and keep your balance. Because I used to be a gymnast, though, I had great balance. My therapist put the shorties on me. I stood up and looked up at her. “Now what?”
She shot me a confused look. “Weird—you’re not even holding on to anything.”
I shrugged. “Am I supposed to be?”
She looked me over and then walked toward me. “Hold on a second.” She put her fingertips on my chest and nudged me. I leaned back an inch or so, and then I straightened up. (I didn’t take a step because I hadn’t learned how to do that yet.) Then she gave me a push forward, and I did the same thing in the other direction. We went side to side, and each time I came up straight and steady. She nodded. “That’s pretty impressive for your first time on new legs.”
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