Five years ago today, a knock on the front door interrupted an unseasonably warm February Saturday. I was surprised when I looked down the hall to see a KCMO police officer standing on the stoop. In that instant, I knew that something was terribly wrong. The officer confirmed my gut fear right away. He was there to inform us that Nathan had been critically injured while in his last semester at MU. 

Within seconds, our lives swirled into a blur of not-moving-fast-enough to gather some essentials and get Carter strapped into his carseat and we were on our way to Columbia. The 2 hours car ride along I-70 was filled with phone calls and tears and anxiety and dread at what we would face when we arrived. Resident doctors explained the details to us in quiet, serious voices and friends tried to help us piece together what had happened overnight. Nathan had been walking home from the bars after a night out with friends and had been hit by a car just two blocks from home at a very busy intersection at the corner of campus. He had sustained life-threatening injuries; Traumatic Brain Injury (Diffuse Axonal), Multiple Skull and facial fractures, as well as his clavicle, both tibias and his right fibula. He had a drain in his head to keep the intracranial pressure from getting too high, he was sedated with IV medicines and was on a ventilator to keep him breathing. He was broken, bruised, and swollen. 

Those 11 long days in the ICU were filled with exhaustion and emotion, but also with love and support from all over. Our families, friends and Nathan’s friends and faculty rallied around us and helped us navigate countless issues. From assisting us with figuring out his academic status to finding the keys to his house and car and even feeding us from overflowing baskets of snacks, gift cards, and frozen meals, we were buoyed up by visits, phone calls, text messages, cards and help of every kind. 

And Nathan, slowly every day, made a little progress. With only an occasional minor concern or setback. I’m so grateful for that to this day. There was so much fear and anxiety about the future, but the present lead us slowly but surely forward. The swelling stopped in his brain, his lungs worked independently and the surgeries fixed his broken bones. We graduated from ICU. 

Then the hard work came at Rusk Rehabilitation Hospital. No one was sure what we were going to accomplish when we first arrived there. Health care professionals were describing him as “low level”. He couldn’t talk, he couldn’t eat, he didn’t know where he was or what had happened. He couldn’t even hold his head up on his own. But the environment there was so different from the hospital. Right from the first day, they put him in his own clothes and put on shoes and socks. They fitted him for a wheelchair that supported his weak body. And they started therapy. For everything. To learn to sit up, to eat, to speak. To wake up his brain and reroute the billions of damaged neurons. To regain his memory. To regain his life. 

Those five weeks brought tremendous gains and he walked out of Rusk on his own two feet. Slowly and with a walker, but on his own. I will never forget how they “clapped” us out. They have a tradition there where every available staff member lines the corridor that leads to the exit. And they say goodbye and applaud. It was an exhilarating and terrifying moment. We were headed home! But then what? 

The outpatient part of his recovery took months; more physical therapy, occupational, speech and cognitive while living at home. He gradually started driving again, started working and taking responsibility for his own finances and education. He finished his degree. And then he surprised us all by signing up for more classes. He completed a second bachelor’s degree! This time in Spanish. 

The rest of his recovery took years. Healing his Trauma, the psychological and emotional, took us to psychiatrists and therapists and adjuncts I had never heard of before: Neurofeedback, Interactive Metronome and Grovian Metaphor. It was expensive, and time-consuming and hard work. But we never gave up. HE never gave up on himself. And it all worked slowly to decrease the emotional upheaval that happens when your life is nearly destroyed. 

He has proven to us time and again how unstoppable his is. He may have been down sometimes, but he never gave up. He has never let any of this stand in the way of what he wants to accomplish. At least not for very long. He continues to work, travel and live his life very independently and on his own terms. And he continues to recover. His injuries are permanent, but he has always found new ways to navigate and work around the limitations his brain and body have sustained. 

As this anniversary approached, I asked him if he wanted to recognize this day or write anything or say anything to commemorate it and he declined. I was not surprised. He has not let this moment in his life define him at all. He would just as soon never mention it again if left to his own preferences. But I think it’s important (and he did agree to let me update his Caring Bridge) to leave a message out there for others who may be at the beginning of their journeys and searching for hope. Nathan’s story is a message of hope. 

I also wanted to take the time to again thank every single person who helped us during this journey. From the first responders who saved him, to the trauma team that swiftly made all the right decisions that not only kept him alive but salvaged true quality of life, to the nurses and therapists and family and faculty and friends who stood by him and us through all of this. He would not be the independent, hard-working guy that he is without every one of those who used their expertise and knowledge and patience and optimism and often literally strained their own backs and muscles to help him regain his life. The names are too many to list and I would probably leave off many who deserve huge acknowledgement. But please know that your names and faces and words of encouragement and your efforts will always be in our hearts. In my heart for sure. I as the momma will never ever forget. Thank you. 

https://youtu.be/RIAoVhwnnXo