The Tragicomedy that is Ray’s Life
Dec 7 2020
Tragicomedy: a literary genre that blends aspects of both tragic and comic forms. Most often seen in dramatic literature, the term can describe either a tragic play which contains enough comic elements to lighten the overall mood or a serious play with a happy ending
I should have started this a while ago. Like before I practically died. But hey, better late than never, right? I don’t even know where to begin. I just want my story to be out there for people to read, laugh at, share, etc. Or maybe someone is going through something similar and they need to read this. If that’s the case, please reach out to me. My main hope is that you read this, take a deep breath, and gain a new perspective. As bad as you might think your life is, it could always be worse….unless you’re dead…but you’re not because you’re reading this. I know, you’re probably rolling your eyes. I was told “It could always be worse” multiple times a day in the hospital and I would just smile and nod, but internally I was saying “Fuck off, you have no idea.” whilst also giving them double birds. But now that I can fully understand how close I was to being dead and gone (trust me I would’ve been gone…none of y’all would’ve seen me in heaven) I can actually understand and appreciate that statement. I’ll get into my hospital stay and the wreck later. I have a lot I want to share. I am going to open up like I never have before. Some of my best friends, who I tell everything to, are going to read things about me that they didn’t know. Sharing everything you’re about to read took a LOT for me to be comfortable with. But, I’ve recently learned how precious life is and that it can be taken away at literally any given moment. I want my story to be out there because if I had died in that car wreck, then nobody would’ve known things about me that I kept hidden. Will I share too much? At times, probably so. Will I regret some of the personal things I share? I’m sure. But, I want to give y’all a point of view as close to mine as possible. This is the unfiltered story from Ray Stevens’ point of view. If you want to judge me for things I’ve done or said, be my guest. I am unapologetically myself. You either love me or hate me for it. I want to start this blog not so much for friends and family to keep up with my recovery and sometimes interesting (?) life, but more so for others. I feel like I am in a unique position with everything that has happened and want to try to turn this into something positive. If I can help someone who is struggling with something similar or give hope to just one person or make just one person gain a new perspective, then this will all have been worth it. Now that y'all know my purpose and hope for this, I’ll start. Feel free to skip around posts as you wish. These initial posts won't be chronological; you don’t have to ingest them in order. Although I will try to make it flow smoothly and not just have independent, oftentimes unconnected, thoughts written down like how my brain operates.
So, I guess I’ll start with the wreck. If you know the details, just skim over this part. Or if you’d like to recount one of the worst days of my life, keep on reading. I was in a very serious car accident with my mother and friend, Ben Van Cleve, on our way to the beach on May 6, 2020. We were hit head on on the highway in some bum-fuck town in northeast Mississippi by a car full of supposed meth addicts. *DISCLAIMER*: This is not stating or accusing these 3 outstanding citizens of having ever used, purchased, sold, or cooked (I don’t know if that’s even the right verbiage) methamphetamine. But I will say that at least, but not limited to, one person in their car had an arrest warrant for drug related charges and I bet you could guess that drug. I think I have to legally put this disclaimer here so these people don’t sue me and put all that money towards some Breaking Bad scale meth-lab in northeast Mississippi. But, lucky for me, for them to sue me they would need access to the internet as well as to possess basic reading skills, so, I’m good. That’s what I get for living in Mississippi I guess. Never again. Anyways, we were all taken by ambulance to North Mississippi Medical Center in Tupelo. Ben, thankfully, had escaped with only minor injuries. My mom was rushed into emergency surgery to stop internal bleeding from a perforated small intestine and had a vertebral compression fracture. I took the brunt of the accident. I too had a perforated small intestine that was discovered later that night and was successfully repaired. I broke my back, neck, collarbone, both shoulder-blades, left ankle, left fibula, left wrist, left arm, and all but two ribs. I also had to get several stitches on my chin and face (chicks dig scars, right?). The carotid arteries in my neck experienced so much trauma that it caused me to have a stroke and lose feeling/have paralyzation on my left side. I had to have back fusion surgery and now have 2 rods and 10 screws in my back. This will elevate my golf game, right? I mean Tiger had this same surgery before winning the Masters. I’m not saying I’m going to win the Masters, but you’re gonna want to be on my team in any scrambles. I had pins in my left arm/wrist. My ankle was absolutely wrecked. It was swollen since the wreck and I still can’t really feel my toes. I had to have ankle reconstruction surgery about two months ago. That was absolutely miserable.
I was in the hospital for almost two months. I do not remember anything except for the last two weeks. One day that I don't remember, I picked up the phone and called a friend whose number I remembered by heart. He later described the phone call to me. He said how shocked he was to hear my voice on the other end of the phone...didn’t believe it. Most of my friends knew I was alive, but thought I was incoherent. They were all, I later came to find out, worried I was not going to remember them or have the same personality because of all the brain trauma. My doctors were the ones that informed my family of this then that was passed on to my friends. They were basically worried I was going to have to relearn everything and who everyone was because the doctors had no idea what my mental OR physical state was going to be. All they could tell anyone was that I was alive. My friend said I was talking to him as if nothing had happened. I guess I was staring out of my room window at a parking garage because I began to complain to him about “how shitty” the view was from my condo.
“Dude, these assholes fucking ripped us off. I don’t remember this view online. I can’t even see the fucking beach! I’m staring at a parking garage from my bed. We’re also on like the 4th floor. Something isn’t right. I guess they moved us to a villa.”
Imagine being my friend, who had no idea if I was going to even remember who he was, answer a phone call from an unsaved number, with me on the other end saying “What’s up?”, to later find out I called his number from memory. He tried telling me I was in a wreck on the phone but I apparently wasn’t having any of it and would say “Nooooo bro. I’m at the beach.” He was left confused and speechless. I called another friend by memory. He said he asked me how I was feeling. And, as if it was the first time I noticed, responded with a hint of confusion, “Like shit…I feel fucking horrible. I’m like really sore. Must’ve had a good night last night. I can’t remember anything.” I then asked him to give me my mom’s cell phone number because I couldn’t find her inside the condo and I guessed she was down at the beach. I still have no explanation as to how I could remember their numbers, but not my mom’s. Sitting here, I have to put some brain power into remembering their numbers, but can instinctively remember my mom’s. Another somewhat unbelievable case of brain function came from me continually asking my nurses if a certain date in May had passed because it was one of my best friend’s birthdays. I say a specific day in May because I have no clue what that day is off the top of my head. If I didn’t hear the stories of me asking that, I wouldn’t have even known it was in May. I’m the type of person who only knows it’s someone’s birthday if I check my Facebook notifications or see the birthday emoji next to someone’s name on snap chat. I could remember his birthday, but I couldn’t remember asking the nurses every few hours if that day had passed or not.
I can’t remember anything before the last two weeks. Everything I mention that happened before is second hand information from the stories I was told. I apparently kept calling the nurses into my room to itch my face, even though I could use my right hand perfectly fine. I also called the nurse into my room to ask her if we could take my horse to the old town road…..then started singing the song….. I was apparently a horrible patient until I got back to a halfway normal state. I was continually ripping out my IV’s and trach tube that went into my throat, asking for more pain meds just minutes after getting them, telling nurses to get me certain drinks and food then getting mad at them when they wouldn’t leave the hospital to get whatever it was that I wanted. Oh, and I also kept trying to get out of bed and walk around. I was apparently so bad that they asked my brother about putting me into a medically induced coma and on a breathing machine. Needless to say, my brother told them, very politely, to fuck off. So with that, they decided to put me into restraints in my bed. Imagine how I reacted to that.
My mom recovered more quickly than I did because her injuries weren’t as bad as mine (I don’t know why I say that with confidence as if I won some fucked up game). As soon as the doctors told her she could visit me, she hopped in a wheelchair and told the nurses to take her to the ICU and surgery floors where I was staying. She would spend as much time as she could with me in my room and would have to leave around 9 or 10 o’clock at night when I would take my pain meds and pass out. She said I would call her at 6 am every morning, frustrated, asking her when she was going to come see me because “its been days” since she came to see me…even though she was there 8 hours before. Apparently I was also hallucinating because I kept recounting to my mother all of these detailed conversations I had with people that came to visit me…drugs are wild, man.
That was all the stuff I couldn’t remember. Now, for the stuff I do remember.
I remember “coming to” in the hospital confused as fuck. I had no idea what was going on, why I was in the hospital, where my mom was or what was wrong with me….and when I couldn’t move my left arm or hand when I tried, I had a full on panic attack. I then looked up and saw there was a nurse sitting on the couch in my room. Later, I found out that I was such a horrible patient (you know, because I kept ripping out everything and calling nurses to my room every 15 minutes and trying to get out of bed) that they had to give me a “sitter” who stayed with me 24/7. I asked her what was going on and all she knew was that I was in a car wreck, but couldn’t tell me any specifics about my injuries. I didn’t know I couldn’t get up. I remember trying to get out of the bed but couldn’t move my left leg. She saw me trying to get up and told me I couldn’t get out of bed without help. That’s when I found out about the stroke. I had to slowly find out what all was wrong with me from asking the doctors when they’d come and visit me every few days. Leaving the hospital, I still didn’t know what all was wrong with me. I just hurt.
After coming to, I started physical therapy. The first day, they tried to put me in a wheelchair to get me to the gym. I couldn’t get in the wheelchair because that was the first time I had sat up since the wreck happened. I was in so much pain that I couldn’t sit up. Well, on to the second day. I remember this as the day I truly realized the extent of my injuries. The day started with them fitting me for a wheelchair and teaching me how to use it. I stopped and asked why they were doing this. They said it was because I would be using a wheelchair for the near future, maybe even until I got home. Basically, I was going to be stuck using a wheelchair for a while and that’s being optimistic about my left side coming back. I could be needing assistance for the rest of my life. Nobody knew. I wasn’t having it. It was not an option. They needed to figure something else out. I was NOT using a fucking wheelchair. I didn’t care if I had to crawl everywhere; my ass was NOT being confined to getting around by wheelchair. I don’t know if they were just trying to appease me so I would see for myself that I would need a wheelchair or if they genuinely believed there were other options, but they started working with me to use a walker. They knew I would walk again, but not nearly as fast as I did. I don’t think they were used to young people in their 20’s coming in there that could heal so fast. Especially with my mindset. Nobody was going to tell me I couldn’t walk or play golf or workout again. Fuck ALL of that. So, they fit me for a walker and I learned how to get around, just not exactly on my own. Someone had to be behind me to push my left foot forward for me, as I still couldn’t move it. After about 3-ish days of using the walker in therapy, I felt like I could take the training wheels off and go to a cane. PAUSE. I had just learned how to use a walker in the span of 3ish days and I had zero practice outside of the 3-hours of therapy that I wasn’t confined to my bed. My muscles were so atrophied and weak. I lost 55 pounds in the hospital. I had so many broken ribs showing that the ASPCA should’ve paid me to be in one of those “In the arms of an angel” commercials with all of the abused and malnourished dogs. But, even if I tried to get up to practice walking, the bed alarm would’ve gone off. I was so weak I would’ve fallen straight down even if the bed alarm was turned off…trust me I tried. One day, I thought I could go to the bathroom by myself. I tried to stand up, the bed alarm went off, and I fell straight forward, hitting my head on the bathroom door giving myself a knot. After having to get picked up off the floor by nurses, I decided I wouldn’t do that again. So, for the other 21 hours in the day, I was in bed. Except for when I had a nurse help me go to the bathroom (unfortunately for me, these nurses were not attractive. This was not the way I pictured my nurse fantasy playing out.) RESUME. So, like I said; time to take the training wheels off. I go to therapy one day and tell them I’m ready. I don’t know myself if I’m ready, but it was time to balls up. I honestly didn’t think I was going to be able to do it but I didn’t care. I was going to make it work. I have to be able to walk again. Fuck a wheelchair. They hand me the cane. I get up out of the wheelchair and start to take steps. Muscle memory had come back the last few days and I was able to pull my left leg forward using my hip muscles. I start walking. Let me repeat. I START WALKING. I take a few steps; the therapists walk behind me with my wheelchair in case I fall back. I don’t know if the adrenaline rush from trying to walk for the first time in months had anything to do with it, but I WAS FUCKING WALKING! Albeit it was only a few steps at a time, but I was walking. I stopped to look back at the therapists because I couldn’t believe what was happening and when I saw them I started crying. We were all so happy. This was something I didn’t know if I was going to be able to do again…at least not for the near future. I had asked the doctors if I was going to be able to walk again and they couldn’t tell me an answer for sure. But I was doing it. That was the day I realized I could lead a normal life again.
All I wanted to do from then forward was walk. I walked up and down hallways, stairs, more hallways, outside, more stairs, to the cafeteria, to nurses I knew so they could see me walking….I didn’t care where I was going. I just wanted to walk. I think I text everyone I knew and told them I was walking. Once I started walking, I wanted to go home. I thought I was good to go. I was not. I still couldn’t move my left arm or hand…til 2 nights later. I was sitting in bed relaying all of the great happenings of the last few days to my friend over the phone while I was eating dinner. Pause again. I tried everyday, almost all day, to move my left arm. This was, on the surface, the last big thing I couldn’t do. I tried SO HARD everyday to move it. Resume. Like I said, I was on the phone eating dinner. I was holding the phone with my right hand and, instinctively, went to pick up my fork with my left hand to get another bite. Now, this was NOT a coordinated effort. Did my left arm take out almost everything I had sitting on the table including my drink? Yes. Did I care? NO!! I JUST MOVED MY LEFT ARM! I immediately told my friend I had to go. What do I do now? I want to show my therapists, but I won’t see them til around 7:45 in the morning. I want to show everyone. I take a snap chat. Click everyone’s name I can. Send. Take a video for my mom. Send. Check to see if one of the nurses who I know well is on duty right now to show her. She’s not. Damn. Guess I’ll have to wait til the morning to show anyone. Kelly, my OT, comes to my door around 7:40 every morning to make sure I’m ready for therapy at 8. I couldn’t sleep that night because I was so ready to show everyone at therapy that I could move my left arm now and also wanted to get started on therapy to help gain more function back. I remember calling the nurse around 6:30 to help me get up and showered and ready for therapy. Time creeped by that morning. As soon as that door opened and Kelly walked in, I was already telling him about the great news. We get down to the gym and he asks me how it happened and then tells me to show him. I try to move my arm….nothing happens. “Fuck. I swear I moved it last night. Here I got a video of it”. I show him then I tell him I want to try one more time. IT MOVES “HA HA! I TOLD YOU!” Kelly seems just as happy and excited as I am. Now, it wasn’t a lot of movement, but i could pick it up to slightly lower than shoulder height for a couple seconds, then it would fall back down. We worked on hand and arm therapy for probably 2 hours that day. He put a straw in a cup of water and I worked on raising the cup to where I could drink out of the straw. Did I spill water all over myself? Absolutely. But I was using my left arm. The two happiest days since the wreck were when I took my first steps and when I moved my left arm (besides the Stars going to the Stanley Cup). ~It’s the little things~. In the days following, I eventually lost the need for a cane, but had to carry it with me everywhere in case I needed it.
So, I was starting to use my left side again and I was walking. Pause. For those of you who have never spent an extended amount of time in a hospital, it is literally hell on Earth. My personal hell would be an eternity of taking unimportant, substanceless, and useless undergrad courses (so, basically 99% of undergrad classes) and having to take exams for said courses. Can you tell I learned a plethora of interesting and useful things at Ole Miss? Yeah, me neither. My other hell would be prison. I’ve spent my fair share of nights in the Lafayette County Detention Center (5 nights total to be exact). But, did you even go to Ole Miss if you never spent a night in the drunk tank? For some reason I think the partying and spending random Tuesday nights in the drunk tank are related to me not learning anything in undergrad, but I can’t be sure. Now, I know spending nights in a drunk tank and prison are two completely different things, but if it's anywhere similar then I couldn’t do it. Jesus take the wheel. Anyways, I say this not to brag about doing alcohol, but because spending two months in the hospital is comparable to the two aforementioned examples. Resume. Once I started to be able to get around well by myself, I was ready to get the fuck out of there. I began asking doctors and therapists when I could leave and that's when I was informed about the “meetings”. So, to get released from the hospital, all of your doctors, surgeons, therapists, and your case worker meet to discuss your progress. If they all agree that you can function without the help of therapists and nurses on your own, then they can approve you to be discharged. But, before they all meet to discuss your possible release, you have to prove you can function on your own. This involved showering, getting dressed, brushing teeth, etc. Basically anything you would have to do if you were getting ready at home on your own. Now, back to my impatience with living in a hospital. I was patient at first. I was told one day that they were having “the meeting” and was like a kid on the night before Christmas because I knew I had shown that I can function on my own. Everything was great that day….until I got the verdict. I had to stay another week. This is when I started to get impatient with everyone and everything. Looking back, they were right in keeping me. I had just started to move my left arm a few days before and I needed that intensive inpatient therapy. But the 4 am wake up calls just to check your vitals or draw blood, the borderline inedible food and, you know, the whole sitting in a bed for 21 hours a day was getting VERY old. So, now I have to wait a whole week AT LEAST until they meet again to discuss my release. But, this is when the fun started.
I could finally have visitors because for the initial month or so I was in there, no visitors besides family were allowed because COVID (fuck you COVID). One day when my friend and I were talking about how shitty my living situation was, I jokingly said to him that I should just sneak out with him when he leaves and take me back to Oxford. We both laughed about it but then we looked at each other and, like it was a fucking movie, he said “You think we could actually pull it off?” Yes….but it would take some planning. I was on the second floor and there was an outdoor courtyard that led to a construction parking lot. Only problem was that there was a fence enclosing the courtyard from the parking lot. I would have to somehow make it on the other side and ya boy was not gonna be able to climb a fence. Fuck. Okay well maybe I could just walk straight out of this place and they wouldn’t know. That was about the only possibility at this point. We wanted to go check out the entrance but I can’t leave my room and even if I could, I have zero idea where the entrance/exit is. So, I do my homework. I find out, thanks to google, that there is a Starbucks by the entrance as soon as you walk in. I know what I’m doing now. I need to get downstairs to see if there is a desk with nurses or anyone at the entrance/exit that would see me and possibly stop me. The next day when I’m in therapy, we go for our usual walk around the hospital. But, this time I ask my therapist if we can go get a Starbucks coffee downstairs. She said yes so we took the elevator downstairs. We turn a corner and I see the Starbucks and then there she is in all her glory….the exit. I swear the exit was emitting a bright golden hue around it much like I imagine the gates into heaven look like. We get coffee, which I couldn’t care any less about, then she asks where I want to go. I still haven’t had time to fully see what I’m working with here but I see a bench right next to the exit. I say we should sit down to drink our coffee. I sit down and take a look around. There’s no front desk or anything. So far, so good. Then I look outside and there are two tables with 4 people sitting at them. I ask my therapist what they are there for. She says they check visitors in and all hospital staff have to go through them to get their temperature taken before they come into work. Then they check visitors out when they leave to keep track of who has had visitors because patients can only have one visitor a day. Fuck. We might have hit a roadblock boys. Everyone that leaves has to walk by the table to check out. And to check out, you have to have checked in, or else they’ll know you were in the hospital before and likely a patient. They would for sure know I was a patient because I was in a back brace and a leg cast with a cane. I’m explaining all of this to assure you my friend and I had brainstormed on the phone for hours of ways around that front desk. I felt like one of the fucking penguins in Madagascar trying to escape the zoo. I’ve seen enough of the exit. Back to the drawing board.
I spend the next hour or so in my room on the phone with my friend thinking of other ways out. I think about the fence in the courtyard. There has to be a gate out or something. I need to go check it out again. The next day another friend comes to visit. It’s now 5 days until they have another meeting about my release. But as far as I’m concerned, it’s going to be another no and then another week. I’ve gotta get out of here. My friend comes to visit after my therapy for the day. I fill him in on my plan. I get permission from the nurse to leave my room and we walk out to the courtyard. Holy shit. There’s a gate in the far corner where I hadn’t looked yet. I send my friend over to check it out. It has to be locked right? What happens next is hilarious. He pushes the gate open and an alarm starts going off. At this point I’m sitting down laughing my ass off. A security guard comes out and turns the alarm off. He asked why we tried to open the gate and I said “To escape...fuck this place”. He laughed and told us this wasn’t going to work. Yeah whatever. Back to the drawing board AGAIN. I felt like Michael Scofield in Prison Break...except instead of a tattoo of the map, I have tattoos of roman numerals and “life rips”. My mom, who was already discharged and back in Oxford, calls me that night to check in as usual. I complained to her everyday how miserable I was, but this time it all finally boiled over. I told her about my previous plans to escape and everything that had happened. I told her that I’m just going to walk out of this hell hole that Thursday whether they agreed to discharge me or not, and get a friend to take me back to Oxford.
Thursday was the day of the next “meeting”. The next day I very matter-of-factly informed my nurses and therapists that I would be leaving Thursday. They knew I wasn’t supposed to be discharged yet because they were the ones in the meetings that told the doctors if I was ready or not. So, knowing my plan of escape, word got back to the doctors. They approached me about it and I hit them with the factuals. I wasn’t taking any more shit from them. I told them I can do everything on my own and that the house I’ll be living at in Oxford will be with my brother and mother and that they’ll do anything that I won’t be able to. I tell them that I can, in fact, tell time and will be able to take my meds on a regular time schedule. Was I an asshole? Very much so. Did I cuss out my caseworker and at least one other doctor? Yes (If you’re reading this, I’m sorry Mrs. Penny. All love). But I wanted them to know I was serious. I told them to have all of my prescriptions ready by Thursday because that’s when I would be discharging myself. They took me seriously I guess because they had another meeting and informed me they were discharging me Thursday IF I could prove to the therapist that I could get ready in the morning by myself, unassassisted. I agreed. Oh, no, I’m sorry. I’m not Matthew McConaughey from the Lincoln Lawyer. But, I can see how you’d be confused after that performance. I should be a fucking lawyer. That’s how you negotiate. Although at the time I Iooked more like McConaughey from Dallas Buyers Club instead of Lincoln Lawyer….but that’s beside the point. I wasn’t even that happy to be honest with you. Everyone would come by and say “I bet you’re so happy to be leaving!” I would just respond with “Yeah. It was about fucking time.” So, back to what I described about all the stuff I had to do to prove I could get ready by myself to leave. I go to bed the night before knowing what is riding on me getting ready unassisted and on time the next morning. I shower, dry off, brush my teeth, and put all my clothes on all with only one arm. This is the part where I fucked up the first try. I had to put on my back brace, neck brace, arm splint, and leg boot all by myself. Now, if you gave me 30 minutes to do all of that, I could do it. But I was in a race against time putting all that shit on by 8 o'clock. I didn’t get it on in time and I also had a few other hiccups. My therapist said I didn’t pass the test and that I would have to do it again tomorrow. Alright. I mean, I was close. But as every golfer over the age of 70 and some middle aged douche bags with headcovers on their irons say; close is only good in horseshoes and hand grenades. I just needed to get up a little earlier. It was a lot of moving parts for someone who had help doing everything before. When I got back to my room after therapy I practiced doing everything (except showering) probably 5 times. I was NOT fucking this up again. I’ve gotta do this to leave. So, next morning I got up an hour and a half before therapy. The therapist came in just as I was getting out of the shower. I did everything right and on time that morning. I passed. I was going the fuck home tomorrow.
This might be the most important part of this post. Looking back, I cannot say THANK YOU enough to those nurses and therapists I had in the hospital. Amy, Kelly, Mrs. Donna, Mrs. Darlene….the list goes on but those 4 saw me at my absolute lowest (Kelly in particular. He had to help me shower and clean up before therapy). I know it’s y’all’s job and all that, but, seriously, without y’all’s help and patience (emphasis on patience) I wouldn’t be where I am today. If I can ever repay y’all one day, I will (Amy I still haven’t forgotten about those chicken tenders you wouldn’t let me Venmo you for). It’s gonna look like Publishers Clearing House Giveaway when I run into the gym with giant checks and balloons to give away. Jokes aside, for real, I owe you guys everything. I didn’t realize it at the time, but those first few weeks of therapy were the most important and, although I don’t miss that hospital in the slightest, I do miss going to y’all for therapy. Every time I make a big stride in recovery, I want to call y’all and tell you about it. I’m sorry y’all had to put up with me for 6 weeks. I probably had the dirtiest mouth any of yall have ever seen in a patient. I do like to think I brought a light into the gym though. I’m sure I was a nice change up considering every other patient in there was an AARP member and had a pocket full of Werther’s Originals. Yall kept me sane and always lifted my mood if I was having a bad day. Yall gave me hope and encouragement when I needed it most. I saw y’all everyday and talked to you about my escape plans, how I was feeling, what I was missing, how much I hated the shitty food, and any possible ways of sneaking beer into my room. Thank y’all, again, for EVERYTHING. Yall are the reason I am where I’m at today. I will get back to Tupelo to see y'all soon. Oh, interesting tidbit about Amy. So I talked about how my main goal in therapy was to be able to play golf again. On top of talking about it everyday, the PGA tour resumed from the COVID hiatus my first week in therapy, so I was always watching golf on my phone during therapy Thursday through Sunday. Then on Monday I would talk to people in the gym about the tournament. So, everyone knew how into golf I was. She waited til my last day in therapy to mention the fact that her father in law designed the putting arc with VJ. Yes, that putting arc. It’s used by weekend golfers all the way to PGA Tour players. I didn’t believe her at first. I thought her father in law just made putting arcs based off the legit one. No, he makes the legit one. She brought one on my last day in therapy and I practiced putting for the first time in 2 months for probably an hour. She came to say bye the next day and brought me a putting arc of my own. I’ve been using the hell out of that thing because it's the only golf related activity I’ve been able to do. I have no excuse for missing anything inside 6 feet when I get back to playing and I have Amy to thank for that.
The first couple of weeks after getting out of the hospital were the hardest for me mentally. I think it was because I was back home and I couldn’t function like I normally would. It wasn’t until I was back home when I really became aware of all the things I couldn't do. I was constantly reminded of this. I still think this is all a horrible dream. I wake up almost nightly in a sweat thinking everything that has happened was just a nightmare. Then I try to use my left hand to turn the lamp on and realize this is all very much real. When I got home from the hospital, I wanted to see all of my friends. They would come over to hangout or pick me up and I’d go to their house or we would all go get lunch or dinner or drinks or go to the bar. That was when it really hit me the hardest. I hate when people do stuff for me. I’m a very independent person. I mean, I’ve basically lived by myself for 5 years in a 3 bedroom house. I do most things by myself and I love it. Now my friends were having to help me get into and out of cars, making sure I always had a place to sit, asking if I was comfortable, having to always make sure wherever we went had elevators if we were going somewhere with stairs, asking if I wanted to do something else, etc. I hate that shit. I know it was all out of love but I felt, and still feel, like a fucking charity case. I felt like I was a make-a-wish kid everywhere I went. I was in a back brace so, naturally, everybody stared. Normally, I wouldn’t give a fuck. But everywhere I went there were people wanting to know what happened or I would see people I knew and everyone would always say how sorry they were for me and throw a pity party. Don’t get me wrong. I love the concern and the fact that all of these people care for me. I do. It’s one of the things I’m most thankful for. But, it made me feel like a bitch. I still feel like a complete bitch. I went from being in the best shape of my life, feeling the most self-confident I’ve ever been and doing all these fun things to feeling vulnerable and like a complete bitch having to rely on other people. Those first couple weeks were, by far, the lowest I’ve ever been in my life. I literally didn’t care if I died. I thought about suicide everyday. I was frustrated with everything I did. I would sit on my balcony and watch all of the guys I play golf with pass through the hole in my backyard. They would always stop and talk to me. It was great to see and talk to them, but seeing them playing golf everyday made me extremely depressed and pissed off. I was supposed to be out there playing with them. Not recovering from a fucking stroke and broken back. I had to stop sitting outside because everytime I watched them play, I would start thinking about everything and that’s when the thoughts got badl. I still very much struggle with depression. I mean, how could I not? I’m not going to use it as an excuse for anything. It is what it fucking is. The way I look at all of this is control what you can. I can’t control what happened to me, but I can control my actions and my mindset going forward. Get the fuck out of bed every morning with a positive mindset and the goal to get a little bit better today. Don’t get wrapped up in the injuries and all the shitty things that have happened thus far because what good is that going to do? That’s just going to make you pissed off at the world, even more depressed and a horrible person to be around. Trust me, I was there in that mind set for the first month after the hospital. Sure, I still have bad days. I have days where I’m pissed off and question everything. But, as soon as I catch myself thinking like that, I give myself a few minutes to let it all out, then I flip my attitude. Quit feeling sorry for yourself. Don’t be a bitch.
This is one of the biggest things I’ve learned from all of this; there isn’t a road map for life. Quit comparing yourself to other people and their lives. There aren’t “checkpoints” in life telling you “This is where you should be and what you should be doing by this age”. I’m supposed to be living and working in Denver right now but I'm not. And that’s okay. Life doesn’t come with directions or an owner’s manual. Your life can change at any given moment. Quit comparing yourself to others and keep your life plans fluid. It’s not the end of the world if you don’t have the job you want or aren’t living in the city you want, etc. Odds are, those people you’re comparing yourself to are miserable, no matter how happy they look on Instagram and Facebook. In all actuality, your life is probably better than theirs, but they’ll never let you think that. You don’t really know the people you’re comparing yourself too. You see their “perfect” outside that they present to the world, but you don’t see the reality of their life. You can see someone driving in their $100k car or at their vacation home in some exotic location or their pictures with their significant other and be jealous and think their life is so easy and perfect. But, everyone has their struggles. These people you’re comparing yourself to might be thinking of suicide or like their life is a never ending cycle of substance abuse and depression. Even the most “fortunate” people have hard lives. Whatever you’re jealous of or basing judgement off in the lives of others is, more times than not, an illusion. So, quit comparing yourself. This proverb gets overused but it's very true: Life is what you make it. If you’re constantly miserable, worried about superficial things that don’t matter and comparing yourself to others, then your life is gonna suck. But, if you love life and have a positive outlook and have a sort of tunnel vision where you’re not concerned with others, then life rips.
It took months to really accept the situation I was in. I remember sitting on the couch after a week of being home thinking this was a huge point in my recovery. I could either feel sorry for myself and be pissed off everyday and pop pain pills like skittles, or I could get off my ass and grind in therapy and have a positive attitude and make the best of it. I mean guys, I can’t even describe how low I was. I absolutely hated every minute I was awake. I looked forward to the sun going down so I could take my pills, pass out and escape reality for a few hours. I would wake up in the morning and be genuinely pissed off that I woke up. I wanted to have another stroke in my sleep and just die. That’s pretty fucked up. I thought my life was over. The road to recovery was so long and seemed so far away and like it would never end that I just thought it wasn’t worth it because I was sure that by the time I recovered, something else would happen like this again, or, I would never get back to how my life was before. I’m sitting here typing this all up with one hand because my left hand isn’t coordinated enough yet to use. My life has been completely flipped on its head. I still can’t see a finish line and I don’t know if I’ll ever be back to where I was before, but I made a decision that day on my couch to try my absolute hardest everyday to get as close to 100% as physically possible. That was the day I threw my pain pills in my toilet and flushed them. I was NOT going to let this fucked up, extremely unfortunate event control and define me and ruin my life. Fuck that. That’s not who I am as a person. I’m not going to let this thing keep punching me while I’m down. I’m going to fight back and get back up. And I will be one of the strongest people you will ever meet because of it.
I feel like this is all a big fucked up life lesson. There are some life lessons you can’t learn unless you experience them. These are often the most important ones. These huge life lessons have 2 outcomes that depend solely upon the person encountering them; 1) Force you into action to overcome them, in turn learning a very important and valuable lesson OR 2) you crumble under the pressure, in turn learning nothing and it defines you in a negative way. Adversity builds character...but only if you can overcome that adversity.
That day on the couch when I made my decision was a fork in the road not only in my road to recovery, but for the rest of my life. Fortunately, my fork in the road had street signs that told me what was ahead...to a degree. To the right was the first outcome mentioned above, to the left was the second. I chose to take the longer, harder road with more obstacles. But, that road will lead me to a place of happiness, success, health, etc. The other road is easier to navigate and much shorter. But, it leads to a place of depression, sadness, self-hate and a much shorter life. We all face forks in the road. Believe it or not, most of them have road signs telling you what is ahead. But, most of us don’t want to read them because the shorter path is easier. We then hit a point where we’re too far to turn around and we regret taking the easy way out. Don’t take the easy way out and regret it later. That’s what I’m actively trying to avoid everyday.
I have some of the best doctors in the country here in Dallas, so I’m in good hands. When I go to my orthopedic surgeons, the halls are filled with famous athletes who have gotten work done there. Current and past NFL, NBA, NHL, PGA, etc. athletes line the walls. On my first visit, my doctor and I were talking about golf and he casually mentioned to me that this was where Tiger came for his back fusion surgery. “Yeah, Tiger got his fusion surgery done on the floor below us.” I was at a loss for words...to me that is so cool. I will be telling people that story for the rest of my life, I’m sure. My physical therapy is at the Cowboys practice facility. I walk into therapy everyday watching professional athletes train and workout. I got really lucky with my doctors and therapists.
My friends know how big of a health and fitness nut I am. Outside of that, the only other things I really genuinely love are playing guitar and golf. I’m used to filling my days from the time I wake up til the time I get in bed with multiple workouts, tennis, golf, biking, and running a few miles. Most days, weather permitting, I would do all of these things in a day. I was pushing myself to what I felt like was my physical limit. I was constantly doing something active. I was basically only inside if I was eating or sleeping. Was I pushing myself so hard all day because there was some underlying reason that I couldn’t pinpoint? Yes, but I didn’t fully believe that until after the wreck.
Rewind to about 2 and a half/3 years ago. I became extremely depressed after a relationship ended that lasted over 2 years. We spent every day together. She lived with me at my place while we were both in school. We got a dog together. She now has full custody lol. I fully believed I was going to marry this girl, and she thought likewise. I’m not going to delve into my relationship and turn this into a thought catalogue post, but it ended because we were both, relationship wise, dumb and immature. But, I’ll be the bigger person here and say I take full blame and responsibility for it ending. Like I said previously, I became extremely depressed after the break up. I couldn’t get out of bed, I couldn’t eat more than a banana or 2 a day, I always felt like I was about to vomit….I felt like I was about to die. I didn’t realize I was feeling like this because of the breakup though. I thought something was physically wrong. I had 3 hospital visits in the span of a week. Outside of being extremely dehydrated and having deficiencies in about everything you could think of, except potassium from the bananas of course, nobody could tell me what was wrong. Then a nurse was talking to me about what was wrong and I told her about the breakup and she seemed confident that it was causing all of this. I didn’t want to believe it. Guys don’t get their hearts broken, right? Guys don’t get emotional, right? WRONG. I agreed to see a psychiatrist. I told her all about the breakup and the cheating and then I told her about how my dad passed away when I was 17 and how she’s the first person I’ve opened up to and talked about it all in 5 years. Imagine being 17 years old and having to make the decision to take your father off of life support…..yeah, so as you can imagine, there were LOTS of emotions and I kept ALL of my emotions bottled up inside. I never even talked to my own mother about my father passing. PAUSE. I don’t have to delve into how great of a father my dad was or how he always wanted the best for us, or how he always made sure he gave my brother and I the best life he could possibly give us, etc. for y'all to get the picture here. He was the epitome of dads. I just hope to one day be half the father and husband he was. He was the greatest dad ever. There was never a shortage of love, from my mother or father, in our house. RESUME. I realized I had never fully dealt, emotionally and mentally, with losing my father. I would cry by myself about it, alone of course, because crying isn’t manly…? To summarize what my psychiatrist told me, since I had never dealt with losing my father, there were all of these emotions held inside. Envision all of the emotions I kept inside being held back by a levee with the water on the other side being emotions. If something emotional happened, I would suppress the feelings involved, and it would be added to the emotions, or “water”, on the other side of the levee. These emotions, or “water”, would sometimes spill over. I would express these emotions that spilled over as anger or frustration, but nothing serious. I would never let my guard down and talk about what I was feeling or let my emotions out. And at this point, I didn’t realize what was going on internally. She explained that my girlfriend was such a large and important part of my life, that losing her brought back thoughts and emotions of losing my father. Which I didn't quite understand. I was OK with the break-up. I didn’t necessarily want it to end, but I knew I needed a break. I wasn’t missing her in the days after like someone you would think that went through a break-up after over 2 years would. That’s why I didn’t believe the break-up was causing all of this. But, as she was describing, it was the cause of my depression; which I didn’t realize I even had. All of these emotions from losing my dad and then losing her could not be held back. The emotions wrecked through my proverbial levee like Hurricane Katrina fueled by Red Bull vodkas and cocaine…and not those light pour RBV’s you get at a half decent restaurant…these were the aristocrat vodkas with a splash of red bull you get at your college bar from your best friend that bartends with a side of methamphetamine disguised as white powder on the end of a key in the bathroom. My emotions wrecked my life quite like the metaphor I just described. If I had fully dealt with the loss of my dad, would the break up have caused all of this? Probably not. But, it was time to now deal with all of my emotions and talk about them….something I was definitely not comfortable with. But, I did it because I wanted to get better. This was when I fully understood the importance of mental health. Before this, I thought it was all bullshit. My mom tried to get me to see a therapist after my father’s passing but I was 17 years old and didn’t want to talk about it all. I thought I could handle it all internally and independently like I handled everything else. Plus, if you don’t want to be at therapy and you don’t accept the fact that you need it, you aren’t going to get anything out of it.
I know I did a shitty job at describing all of that, but I think you get the gist. After going to many therapy sessions and talking through and expressing my emotions, I learned to manage my depression. But back to how this conversation started. I am a health and fitness nut because of all of what I just explained. I remember coming out of that intense depression feeling as if I had a new lease on life. I felt alive. I wasn’t looking forward to night so I could get in the bed and escape reality for 8 hours while I slept. I was actually wanting more hours in the day so I could do more. I dedicated my life from that day forward to being the healthiest I could be and pushing myself to be in the best shape I could be. I do this because of how great it makes me feel both physically and mentally, but deep down I think I’m doing this because of what happened to my father. He was extremely healthy. Worked out, didn’t smoke, wasn’t overweight or have any underlying health conditions. So, I really do all of this to prevent anything like that ever happening to me. For the past 2 years, my everyday life has been filled with fitness related activities and the healthiest meals I could get or make. I was doing 1,000 push ups and 500 pull ups every morning before I would let myself do anything. Then I would have a workout, play golf, play tennis, bike or run….or some variation of these things. This was my way of dealing with my depression. I had to do this or I would feel like shit. Sure, over the last 2 years, I’ve had to tinker with different diets and workouts, but for the 8 months prior to the wreck, I felt like I had it down to a science. It was as efficient as I thought it could be. I no longer hated the skinny frame I saw in the mirror. I had gained 60 pounds in two years and I was comfortable with what I saw in the reflection for the first time in my 23 years of living.I wasn’t complacent with where I was at, but I was OK with it. This was finally going to be the summer that I could take my shirt off at the pool and not feel like a complete pussy. All of my friends could tell the huge strides I had made. I had never felt this good in my entire life, physically or mentally. I was absolutely LOVING life. I was graduating in May and had a job set up in Denver. I was going to live with one of my best friends who was a bigger fitness freak than I was. I was about to be at the pinnacle of my 23 years of living. We were going to hold each other accountable on our diets and workouts. We were going to make a home gym, filling most of our time not spent in an office with working out. I was already mapping out all of our summer hikes and kayaking trips. I was less than 2 months away from moving to Denver and I had never been this happy in my entire life. Everything seemed to be aligning perfectly. Then I got in a car on the morning of May 6 to go to the beach to celebrate graduating college. I woke up a month and a half later in a fucking hospital.
Knowing all of that now, it's easy to understand that one of the hardest things I’ve had to deal with after all of this is my health and physical fitness. I know it seems so miniscule and unimportant in comparison to the bigger picture, but I had finally gotten to a place in my life where I didn’t hate the person I saw in the mirror (both physically and mentally). I was managing my depression great. For the first time in my life I was not only accepting of the person I was, but I loved myself (some would say a little too much, and I would agree). I remember the first time I looked at myself in my hospital room mirror. I just stood there and stared….then had a breakdown in front of my nurse. She didn’t understand. I was hysterical...saying how the last 2 years of my life were all a waste. I still have that feeling but I’ve come to terms with it better because not only will I get back to where I was before, but I’ll be better than I was.
Imagine dedicating every day of your life for a little over 2 years to something starting from nothing; a painting from a blank canvas, writing a book from a blank word doc, building a house from an empty lot, etc. Now, imagine being so proud of the work you’ve done on that painting or that book or that house that you’re at a point where you’re wanting to show people your work; although not done, it's taking shape and everyone can notice and appreciate your work. Now, imagine that painting being stolen from your art studio or that word doc for your book being erased or that house burning down in flames. That’s what I felt multiplied by a trillion when I saw myself in the mirror. Over 2 years of work down the fucking drain. You feel like there's no recovering from this. You’ve now got to start from a blank canvas, start a new word doc, and build a new house. All from scratch. I got my weight taken in the hospital and I was 120 pounds…..I said out loud, in front of my doctor and nurses, that I wished I had died in the car accident. Boy, was that a horrible idea. I had to have a psychiatrist see me everyday in the hospital from then forward. I wasn’t being sarcastic though. I really did wish I was dead. I still avoid looking in the mirror because it brings about extremely negative thoughts and emotions. I hate the person I see in the mirror again. All I want to do is go to the gym and start working out again or start doing home workouts...but I physically can’t. In relation to the situations I described previously, it would be equivalent to you knowing what you want to paint, knowing the words you want to type for the book, or having all of the blueprints for that house, but you can’t start yet….and you don’t know when you’ll even be able to start. It’s the most helpless, frustrating, anger filled feeling I’ve ever had. I know exactly what I want to do, but I can’t physically do it. The painting and house aren’t going to look the same as the ones before just like how I won't look the same as before the wreck. Is that a bad thing? No, not necessarily. Things can always come back better than before. It just depends on the effort you are willing to put forth. This is another one of those forks in the road I previously described. You can either take the harder, longer road filled with obstacles and put your heart and 110% effort into your recovery and come back better….or you let the hopeless and depressed feelings consume you, do the bare minimum, never get back to where you were before and live the rest of your life feeling sorry for yourself. This is where probably most of my depression comes from; Not being able to workout, play guitar or golf. I miss it all so fucking much. You truly don’t realize what you have until it’s gone. But, no need to think about all of the what ifs. I will do all of these things again.
One of the scary/humbling parts about all of this is that none of the doctors or surgeons can explain to me how I survived the wreck. I never realized how close I was to dying until my follow up appointments after I got out of the hospital. My neurosurgeon showed me pictures of the CT scans of my brain and showed me the arteries that were dissected that caused the stroke. Both of the arteries dissected, or tore. One clotted and closed up. The other one remained open. The open one is what caused the stroke. He couldn’t really explain to me why that one artery closed back up, but In his own words he said “If it wouldn’t have closed like it did, we wouldn’t be talking right now.” He then showed me x-rays of my back with all of the rods and screws. He showed me where the cracked and split vertebrae were. There were 4 of them. The ones in my neck weren’t broken as bad as the ones in my lower back. He explained how it's nothing short of a miracle that I’m not paralyzed. Especially from how my lower vertebrae were broken leaving a high chance that my spinal cord could’ve been damaged. They broke horizontally, so you can imagine how close I was to having spinal cord damage. He said combining the stroke from the artery dissection with all of the breaks and fractures in my back, he didn’t have any explanation for how I was still alive, much less still walking. This was the first time anyone had explained all of this to me. I left the hospital after that speechless and humbled....big time. I didn’t realize how lucky I was to be alive. I felt like such a piece of shit for all of the complaining and feeling sorry for myself and negativity I had in the weeks prior. It's honestly hard and scary for me to think about. It’s also pretty much impossible to wrap my mind around. Like I should be dead. Buried. 6 feet deep. A memory. If I’m somehow, by some miracle, not dead, I should AT LEAST be a parapalegic in a wheelchair. And, this is one of the biggest things I’ve wrestled with since the wreck; I’m not a great person. I party, cuss, sleep around, and sin with the best of them. I’m a dick. An asshole. Self-conceited. Anyone who knows me can attest to that. I know this is really dark, but I don’t deserve to have survived that wreck. I’m not religious. Before the wreck, I didn’t believe in “God”. I have no explanation as to why I survived that wreck. But, it’s really hard to not think there was a higher power at work. The whole situation is too crazy to have it be written off as a coincidence, right??? I don’t know who or what it was, but there had to have been something larger than anything I could imagine at work that day. For the first time in my life, I have a feeling that there’s a reason I’m alive. I have no idea what I’m supposed to do or how I’m supposed to find out what it is, but whatever. Here I am.
Special HUGE shoutout to Ben Van Cleve, Sarah Page Sikes and Maddy Politte for putting a VERY special video together for me. I will never forget the first time I watched it trying to hold back tears and failing to do so laying in my hospital bed when Ben and my brother showed it to me. Man….that’s one of the most special things ever. I’m having extreme difficulty trying to put into words how much that video means to me. If you haven’t seen it, go to my instagram and watch it. I still watch it every week or so. Whenever I’m feeling down I watch it and it reminds me of how kick ass my friends are and how #blessed I am for them and how all of these people are wanting me to get better. I know none of these people will probably ever read this but I want to mention them because they don’t understand how much just them taking a video telling me that they hope I get better and that they are thinking of me has impacted me. So, HUGE THANKS to Jesse Palmer, DK Metcalf, Bryan “sweet tart tartin ass” Callen, Tom Segura, Michael Lenoci (the fan favorite for funniest clip), Mark Hayes, Reese Davis, Lane Kiffin, Mike Bianco, Emeril Lagasse, Elijah Moore, Keith Carter, Dansby Swanson, Austin Riley, Mike Soroka and last but CERTAINLY not least, Grady Spencer. Grady, you have been absolutely amazingly great through all of this. I feel like I can talk to you whenever I want to. Which I still can’t believe since your band, (necessary plug here, yall go check them out now!) Grady Spencer & the Work, is one of my favorite bands. Your part of the video was extremely heartfelt. I could tell you genuinely cared. Not that the other people didn’t; I could just tell you seemed to be affected by the news you had just found out from Ben about the wreck. Most of yall dont know this, but I was writing a research project for my final exam on the influence that Mississippi’s music has had on the world and present day bands. I reached out to my favorite bands in hopes of getting to ask them a few questions I could use in my research project. Grady was one of four people who graciously agreed to answer a few questions. We exchanged emails around 7 oclock that night. I couldn’t go to bed because I was on a high from talking to four people from my favorite bands; Grady Spencer & the Work, St. Paul & the Broken Bones, The Head and the Heart, and the Cold War Kids. The next morning I was going to the beach with one of my best friends.
Life was rippin. I talked to Grady the night before all of this happened which, I guess, started our dialogue. After seeing that video in the hospital I remembered the paper I was writing. I then emailed him back in the hospital bed updating him on all of the things that had happened. Everytime I message him, he responds and genuinely cares how I’m doing. I’m just some fan. He doesn’t have to even give me the time of day. But he does and he even wants to meet for some brews as soon as this COVID stuff ends. Oh, and he’s here in Ft. Worth which is like 40 minutes from me. Crazy how all of this worked out. Hopefully my coordination comes back in my left hand and we can even play some music together. Looking forward to that beer, Grady! Thanks for everything!
I know I joke a lot. Almost everything I say or type has, at the LEAST, a slight taste of sarcasm. Does that get me into trouble? Too many times to count. I’m hardly ever serious, but you’ll know when I am. This is one of those moments. I cannot begin to tell everyone how much their love and support and concern means to me. Seriously. I am wiping away tears right now typing this just thinking about it all. I never knew so many people cared about me. At the beginning, when I was at my darkest mentally, I was literally hoping every night when I shut my eyes that I would just not wake up….the ONLY reason I went to therapy and tried my literal hardest to get better everyday was because I wanted to do it for YOU. I did not want to disappoint all of you. I wasn’t doing it for myself. I want to be here as an older brother for Drury. I want to be here as a son for my mom…God knows my mother doesn’t need to lose anyone else. I want to be here as a grandson to my grandparents. I want to be here as a fan for you (however long your baseball career may last, I’ll be there in my Van Cleve jersey) and to take your money on the golf course, Ben. I want to be here to go to Stars games, do coffin chugs and pound Tweas (this word is trademarked by us…jk not really but it should be) with you, Camden. I want to be here as a best friend for you, Sarah Page. I want to be here to annoy you from the other side of the bar for free drinks, Sean. I want to be here to go to rippin concerts with you and call you from my real beach villa, JP. I want to be here in case you need a best man Sims. I want to be here to win the Fernwood 3-man while drinking hazardous amounts of alcohol with you Matt & Colby, I want to be here to stay up till 5 am after the bars with you Tyler, although I’ll 110% regret it the next day. I want to be here to bail you out of Neshoba County Fair jail, Clark (it’s not real jail…the fake security officers had an improvised drunk tank in a barn) I want to be here for you to tell me how inferior, fitness wise, I am to you Sam. Because some of these pussies couldn’t take that. And just because you aren’t mentioned does NOT mean you aren’t special to me. I wish I could list everyone and why they are special to me, but I’m not because, in all honesty, I don’t want to. But, you know who you are. I want to be here as a friend for literally everyone of you, or as an enemy if I don’t like you. (there’s the sarcasm! Shit was getting too serious) I literally couldn’t do this without my friends. I have the best friends and support group anybody could ask for. This all brought into focus how precious true friendship is. Like I said, Y’ALL are the reason I’m still alive and progressing, and I thank you all for that. I seriously, from the bottom of my heart and with every bone (fractured or not) in my body, love every single one of you.
Thinking about all the bad things like the injuries and the things I can’t do is NOT the way to look at this. I am SO lucky to even be alive. I can walk. I can feel. I’m not paralyzed. My mom is still here. Just thinking about how big of a miracle it is for me to be here typing these words is so hard for me to try and understand that it brings me to tears. I could be in so much worse shape. I could be in a wheelchair or having to eat through a feeding tube or not have a limb or be paralyzed on one side of my body from the stroke or be dead. But, I am none of those things. I say all this because the last thing I want after reading this is for you to feel sorry for me. There are other people in this world that are waaayy worse off than I am that really need the prayers, support, love, help, etc. I’m going to be perfectly fine. I will get to do all of the things I want to do in life….except be elected to political office....there is way too much dirt out there on me to do that, but who really wants to run for office anyways? So, don’t feel sorry for me. If you really want to do something for me, I’ll let you buy me a few drinks. Or you can take me to the Masters. Or we can go to Hooter’s in Augusta while we’re there for the Master’s and you can buy John Daly and I drinks. That sounds alot cooler.
I’ll end with this, and PLEASE listen to this part because I almost fucked this up very badly; tell your friends and family you love them every chance you get. Guys, it’s not gay to tell your boys you love them. Hug your mom and your dad while you still have them. Stay in and watch a movie with your mom or a game with your dad instead of going to the same bar with the same people.....I’d trade my life to just watch one last Ole Miss game with my dad. Make sure everyone knows how much they mean to you. If you feel certain relationships have been left in a bad spot, smooth them over. Life is full of decisions and chances. It’s pretty scary, actually, when you think about it. If we’re being honest with ourselves, everything comes down to chance. And I guess life is about grabbing those chances when they present themselves. So, take that trip. Get that tattoo. Move to that city you’ve been wanting to move to. Reach out to that friend you miss that you haven’t talked to in years. Take that risk you’ve been afraid to take. Tell that guy or girl who you can’t stop thinking about how you really feel. Shooters shoot. Open up. Talk about how you feel. Love your life. Tell your friends and family again how much they mean to you. Life is shorter and more fragile than any of us can imagine. I almost had it all taken away from me. Thank yall for reading this. I truly hope you have been able to take something away from this or gained a new perspective or really just anything beneficial. Or maybe you think I’m soft for doing this or less of a man because I talk about my feelings….in that case, I would say I was there a few years ago. I understand. Whatever it is you feel, I hope it’s positive. If any of you EVER need to talk, please do not hesitate to call or text me. I love all of you very much and I am here for you all. If any of you just need a friend and want to go get lunch or drinks or just hang out, let me know. First round is on me. Thanks guys and girls for reading my story and letting me vent. It’s been therapeutic. I love y’all and don't forget….LIFE RIPS!
Till next time
-Ray Stevens