Post #6 - Accidents

Post #6 – Accidents

            Accidents happen.  Some are horrible tragedies while others are just minor inconveniences.  Growing up, I always thought that if a person got hurt they had it coming for some reason.  Later in life, I learned that isn’t always the case.  Sometimes good people get hurt because they were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time.  This was the case with myself.

            Back in November of 2000, I was in a very bad car accident.  I broke my back in two places, and wound up not being able to work for quite some time.  For a long time after the accident, I kept wondering what I had done to deserve what had happened to me.  I sought professional help for depression and multiple suicide attempts.  Only after coming to the reality that I had done nothing to deserve what happened, but rather that it was an accident, was when the recovery process could truly begin.

            Every day I have problems with that injury, but I have to fight through the hard times to be able to enjoy the good times.  One lesson I learned through that ordeal was that I needed to slow down and learn to enjoy life a little more.  At that point in my life, I was doing what most people my age were doing.  Drinking and partying all the time seemed to take the majority of my days.  Only after having my life flipped upside down did I learn to appreciate what I have and work for the things I want in life.

            My current goal is to earn a college degree and start working again after almost 5 years of living on a fixed income.  One thing that was taken from me in that accident was the freedom to work in the field that I love.  I love working on ranches and taking care of animals.  Due to a broken back, I can no longer perform the duties of that job, so I have to return to school and learn a new skill so that I can accomplish what I have set out to do.

            People say that living on a fixed income would be nice.  I know I did.  However, after living on that little amount of money every month for the last 5 years, I have come to realize that while it is nice to be able to do anything you want, it is really hard to enjoy all the time I have because I can’t get out and do anything.  This is the reason that I have made a decision to return to school and earn a degree.  I want to have the financial ability to enjoy all that life has to offer.

            I was a very lucky person.  I could have wound up in a wheelchair for the rest of my life.  Honestly, I don’t know why I am not in one.  I wake up every morning thankful that I can stand up and walk around the house.  I never imagined I would be feeling this way at the age of 35.  My advice is this, don’t take anything for granted.  No matter what you have, who you are, or any other circumstance, life can take away a lot of things, and when it happens, it takes a long time to recover from it.