I was four years old, a custody battle brewing and the only thing in the world I trusted was my brother. He was never the best role model; he was usually drunk or high. Yet not once in my heart did I doubt he loved me. One day my brother came home with a new car, an old ’67 mustang. That night my brother took me out for a drive. In case you don’t know anything about a ’67 mustang; it only has the front seat, and can only fit two people. This is not a car a four year old should be riding in.

            When I was that young I loved watching the limes on the road, the stars in the sky, and the trees rush past a moving vehicle. Around two am one night my brother found every phonebook in the house and put them on the passenger seat so I could look out the window. Neither of us had any inclinations to put on a seatbelt. My brother loved speed, he would role down the windows and just feel the air going through the car.

            We lived on a road that was nicknamed ‘Suicide Rollercoaster’, for good reasons it was all hills and turns. Going just over 100 mph, my brother lost control of the car and sent us slamming into a tree. Being as small as I was and the way I was sitting in the car sent me through the front window; at first. When the air bags deployed I ended up traveling the length of his car and out the back window. I don’t remember much from the next couple of weeks, just pain and the sounds of the machines. About a month after the accident I woke up, this time like nothing happen. I felt fine; and it goes to show the power of morphine. I had broken almost every bone in my body, including most of my spine. When I was finally released I left in a wheelchair to the words ‘never going to be able to walk again.’ This was not allowed to happen, I was in dance so I couldn’t just be in a wheelchair I would lose everything.

After two intense years of physical therapy and the idea that I was going to once aging walk; my six year old dreams came true. I could walk of course I still had leg braces and my neck/back brace; but I could move on my own. I continued telling myself every time I would start to fall back to get up and go to my physical therapy. At the age of seventeen I was cleared from therapy and I didn’t even bring my braces with me to college. I can do everything you can do, but I know what it’s like to not be able to do those things.

            Is your dorm room on the first floor, do you have a step to get in the shower, are your classes all wheelchair accessible? These are questions I used to go through all the time. Even to this day I look at what I can and can’t do. When I was eight I started learning martial arts, I lose it if I don’t practice but I could do a sport. My relationship with my brother became tense after that and after getting in a head long collision around my fifteenth birthday I decided I didn’t need someone in my life that hurt me so much.

            Today I can stand in front of you, I walk the same halls as you; but most importantly I know that I can’t take my body for granted. Try for an hour, don’t use your legs for anything, do you believe you could do it? I know I could, I did it for two years. I know now that you should never take something for granted because it’s not always a given. I know to treat others well because they may be going through something life changing and to never tell myself ‘I can’t’. Through the power of self-motivation you can do anything in the world you want to, and I want to walk across the stage on graduation, walk down the aisle on my wedding day, I want to be able to walk and today I can because I never gave up hope.