January 20, 2026 • 49 mins
On a 110° Grand Canyon trek rerouted by wildfire, Drew Seibert collapsed alone—hallucinating a friend, cooling in a cave, and realizing he might die there. He didn’t. A river guide’s sat phone summoned a helicopter, and Drew went home to Atlanta… where a midnight fall in his bathroom broke his neck and stopped his breathing.
Kept alive by his partner’s improvised rescue and then a ventilator, Drew awoke to a new life as a quadriplegic. What followed was the slow, stubborn work of neuroplastic recovery at Shepherd Center: first wrist, first ankle, standing, driving, and the daily discipline of building strength when it would be easier to give up. Along the way, he reimagined purpose—leaving medicine, going to law school, and now advocating for veterans while speaking frankly about autonomy, access to care, and what we owe one another. “You don’t have a lot of choice in the matter,” he says. “Do the best you can to keep heading in the right direction.”
Story Producer: Brent Dey
If you have a transformative near-death experience to share, we’d love to hear your story! Please email us at aliveagainproject@gmail.com We’d love to hear your story!
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:09):
You're listening to Alive Again, a production of Psychopia Pictures
and iHeart Podcasts.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
My name is Drew Seibert. On February thirteenth, two thousand
and six, my life changed forever. You go through many
different feelings when this happens. It's very devastating, it's very overwhelming.
You can decide to give up, and there's a lot
(00:37):
of people that give up. But I'm going to do
everything I can to not let that happen.
Speaker 1 (00:49):
Welcome to Alive Again, a podcast that showcases miraculous accounts
of human fragility and resilience from people whose lives were
forever altered after having almost died. These are first hand
accounts of near death experiences and more broadly, brushes with death.
Our mission is simple, find, explore, and share these stories
(01:11):
to remind us all of our shared human condition. Please
keep in mind these stories are true and maybe triggering
for some listener and discretion. As advised. I was hiking
(01:32):
in the Grand Canyon and I almost died. It was
a one hundred and ten degree day, I was in
the direct sun. We had to hike in conditions that
were much more severe than what we had prepared for
(01:54):
because there was a wildfire in the Grand Canyon that year,
and they moved our hike to June or July, and
we were hiking in one hundred and ten degree temperature.
I had been in that environment for several days, gradually
getting more and more dehydrated. So when your body starts
(02:20):
to feel the effects of the heat, the first thing
you notice is fatigue, and it's insidious. It starts off
really slowly, and then you realize that, well, I'm hiking
slower than I normally do, or I'm I'm just I
don't feel as strong as I normally do, And that's
the very first thing you notice.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
And by the time you get to the point where
you're dizzy or you're hallucinating, you're way far gone. It
gradually comes on you and you don't realize it immediately.
Forty pound pack on my back, so my center of
(03:03):
gravity was more to the rear. If I had stood
up straight and then passed out at that point, I
might have fallen over backwards and ended up falling down,
you know, a hundred foot cliff. I leaned into the
(03:25):
hill so I wouldn't fall over backwards down a big cliff,
and then I passed out forward and hit my forehead
on the ground, and I woke up right away. But
I realized that I was in a lot of trouble
because I was by myself and it was there was
no help immediately apparent a friend of mine Tim, He
(03:47):
was forty yards off of the trail off to the left, saying, Hey,
come on over here, there's a cave. It's nice and
cool in there, you can cool down. So I scrambled
across the loose rock bucks got to the cave that
was there, and found out that Tim wasn't there. I
(04:10):
had hallucinated him. Fortunately I didn't hallucinate the cave. The
cave was actually there, and I did sit in the
relative cool for a little while, and I also thought, wow,
what a beautiful place this would be to die, Because
I really thought that it might happen. There wasn't any
panic involved. I was like accepting that if it happens, okay,
(04:36):
but I'm going to do everything I can to battle
that and not let that happen. And finally I got
back out of the cave when looking for my friends.
When I found them, I basically collapsed on the ground
in front of them, and one of them said later
that they had never seen anybody that looked so close
(04:59):
to death in their entire lives. We hiked to the
campsite for the night. I continued to have little, vivid hallucinations.
I woke up in the middle of the night and
I was seeing lights that would flash off and on,
just random lights. And the next day we sat down
(05:23):
and had a conversation with all the ten of us,
but realized that there was no way on Earth I
was going to be able to hike out a mile
up on my own power to get out of the
Grand Canyon alone. So we sent the two best hikers
that we had down to the river. They found a
river raft guide who had a satellite phone. Because cell
(05:44):
phones didn't even exist then, especially not in the Grand Canyon.
They called for a helicopter, and within several hours I
was at the top of the Grand Canyon being treated
at the clinic there for severe hypo nature, which is
low sodium in the blood. I was sweating and not
replacing electrolytes adequately enough, even though I had been trying to.
(06:08):
Somebody had died earlier that week of the same thing,
and so I sat in the emergency room in Las
Vegas for fourteen hours getting ivy fluids, and the doctor
finally said, your sodium is now normal. If you go
down to that Denny's down the street and buy a
Grand Slam breakfast, pour a bunch of salt on it,
and eat the whole thing, I'll let you go. And
(06:30):
so I did, and then I flew home. Home at
that time was Atlanta, where I was a gastronurologist with
a practice in Lawrenceville, Georgia. Gastronurologists is a doctor who
(06:54):
treats all the organs in the digestive system, not only
the digestive tract aspect of it, but also the procedural
aspect of it. It's amazing to be able to remove
someone's calling cancer using a scope and tell them after
the procedure, well, I found that you have cancer, but
you're cured. I grew up in northern Kentucky, which is
(07:17):
just across the Ohio River from Cincinnati. I was inspired
to be a doctor by my mother, who was a nurse.
Some of my earliest memories were of her getting dressed
so that she could go to the shift at the hospital.
I had plans to go to a medical practice in Cincinnati,
(07:37):
but I had heard from another GI fellow who had
interviewed in Atlanta that there was a really busy practice
that needed gastronolich is desperately in the north suburbs of Atlanta.
So I had moved to Atlanta from Indianapolis about six
years before my Grand Canyon misadventure. I worked hard and
(08:05):
I played hard on top of that, and it was
a full life. There was a lot to do and
a lot of fun people to do it with. Around
that time, I also met Mary Helen, who I ended
up dating for several years. She was the one that
would eventually save my life. One weekend, we went to
(08:32):
Alabama to see Mary Helen's niece in a horseback riding event.
She ended up doing very well in the horse show,
but we stayed later that we were wanting to and
we're sort of slow coming back. We stopped and got
some artistical cheese and we did some sight seeing along
the way. By the time we got home, it was
(08:54):
rather late and Mary Ellen didn't want to drive more
to get to her house, so she spent the night.
At some point in the middle of the night, I
got up to use the restroom and I tripped over
something and I fell forward, hit my forehead on the
edge of the marble shower and threw my head back
(09:16):
and broke my neck. I must have hit loudly because
it woke her up in the next room, and she
walks in the room and asks, are you okay? And
I'm like no, I said, I can't breathe. She goes,
(09:37):
do you need an inhaler? And I know, well, do
you need an ambulance?
Speaker 3 (09:43):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (09:43):
And then I guess I stopped breathing, and Mary Helen
was left with somebody not breathing on the floor and
didn't know exactly what to do, but she did everything
so well. She called nine one one. They asked if
I was breathing, She said no. They basically explained to
(10:08):
her how to do mouth to mouth. She started doing
mouth to mouth, but then they said, well, the ambulance
is on the way. She had to run downstairs and
open up the front doors and come back up and
resume breathing for me. And even though she's not really
trained in that, she managed to keep me alive for
(10:33):
the eight to ten minutes that it took for the
ambulance to get to my house. Glad I don't live
forty five minutes away from the hospital, because it probably
would have been a different outcome. And the next thing
I know, I'm waking up three days later on a
ventilator at the hospital with a tube in my mouth,
(10:55):
breathing for me and mouth words what happened around the
two tube? And she goes, you broke your neck and
I responded, oh wow, around the tube silently, and then
I passed back out and didn't wake up again for hours.
And this happened evidently repeatedly for a few days. Mary
(11:17):
Helen went with the ambulance to the hospital. They diagnosed
pretty quickly that I had broken my neck, and they
actually told Mary Helen that night that I wasn't going
to make it through the night and to get hold
of my family and let them know. And then I
made it through the night. And then while he's not
(11:40):
going to wake up, and I woke up and well,
he's paralyzed. He's going to be paralyzed for good. This
all happened on February thirteenth of two thousand and six.
(12:03):
It was the day before Valentine's Day. I had gotten
Mary Helen a Valentine's Day gift, some skincare products that
I knew she liked, but I had to order them
from a friend of ours who sold them, and they
were on back order, so they were not going to
arrive by Valentine's Day. I planned to tell Mary Helen
(12:25):
that her gift was coming, but I never got a
chance to ever tell her that. So I'm at the
hospital in the midst of a three day coma and
gift basket arrives at the hospital and Mary Helen thinks
it's from the big group of friends that are there,
and then she looks at the card and reads the
(12:46):
card and realizes that the card is from me. And
I'm lying there in a coma, and it's probably the
first moment that it really hit her hard that she
was grieving mode.
Speaker 1 (13:06):
It took me.
Speaker 2 (13:07):
Weeks to realize that I was in a really severe situation.
I went through what I sort of called my brain fog.
I couldn't feel my body on my nippoline, and I
couldn't move any of my body except for my shoulders
and my head, and my head was in a neck brace,
so I couldn't even move that much. I wasn't comprehending
(13:34):
the enormity of the changes in my life. At one point,
I remember telling my partners, well, I'll get over this
and I'll be back to work at some point, and
they were like dumbfounded that I would even think that
it's possible. My life changed at that moment for being
a doctor in charge of the care of patients to
(13:55):
being a patient. It's really difficult to realize that you
have needs that you can't provide yourself, and that you
have to rely on other people. If you need to
be turned in bed, or you know, you need some
(14:17):
water and you can't get that yourself, then you need
to be able to get the attention of someone, and
you have trouble even just doing that. You don't realize
just the number of things that you have to come
to groups with caregiving, and where you're going to live,
(14:41):
and how are you going to pay for things, and
what medicines do you need and what kind of exercise
program do you need. It's a big change in your life,
and you don't have a lot of choice in the matter.
You've got to deal with it. The doctor's basically told
me that it would be unlikely that I'd ever be
able to walk again. But the underlying reality is is
(15:06):
that an injury to the spinal cord and a lot
of injuries. You do get recovery and there is regrowth
of nerves, which when I was in medical school we
thought nerves never grow back. Again. They do, but they're
very slow. They call it neuroplasticity, regrowth of the central
(15:29):
nervous system. In order to use that, you have to
actually use it. In order to use it, you have
to go through the motions, So you have to learn
how to walk, You have to learn how to move
your arms, you have to learn how to brush your teeth.
I mean, if you don't do these things, you'll never
train your nerves to allow you to do that again.
(16:02):
I may have had a paralyzed body, but I kept
wanting to do things that would make me better. That
doesn't mean that every single day I wanted to wake
up and go spend three hours exercising. But I managed
to drag myself out and do it pretty much every
single day. Mary Helen, when I hadn't, moved into my
(16:23):
house while I was not there, and that was the plan,
and she went ahead and did it. That first year
of being paralyzed as a quadriplegic is pure hell. If
I can say that word. It's a really devastating thing
to go through. It's very hard emotionally and physically obviously,
(16:48):
and after a year we realized that we, for everyone's sake,
needed to break up, and she moved out at that point.
But she she was my savior that year. I mean,
if I did not have her there to help me
get through this mentally and physically, I'm not sure how
(17:12):
I would have made it. When I bought my house,
I didn't realize that it was within one mile of
Shepherd's Spinal Center, which is one of the top spinal
cord injury rehab the hospitals in the nation, probably one
(17:35):
of the top ten, or maybe one of the top
three or four. And Shepherd is literally within a wheelchair
ride of my house. So it was so close, and
it was just very fortuitous that I happened to buy
a house that close to it without even realizing what
it was at the time. Shepherd Center got started because
(18:00):
as a man named James Shepherd was diving in the
surf in Brazil in the early nineteen seventies and a
wave caught him and knocked his head against the bottom
and he got paralyzed with a spinal cord injury very
similar to mine. Actually, he was stabilized in Brazil, but
(18:21):
there was nowhere in the southeast United States that he
could transfer to. The closest was Craig Hospital in Denver,
and his family realized that the best bet that he
would have to get back to Atlanta would be to
start their own hospital. They actually started it in the
basement of a church with six beds, and those six
(18:44):
beds filled up really quickly, and it's been gradually growing
ever since the early nineteen seventies. So when you're paralyzed,
you actually have to make goals in your improvement, and
the first goals are basically just to start movement again
(19:08):
of any sort. When I first started getting a little
bit of risk in my right side and a little
bit of ankle in my right ankle, then they immediately
started pretty intense physical therapy in order to increase those gains.
Then you start making goals. You're brushing your teeth, feeding yourself,
(19:30):
really basic things that you know you don't think when
you're paralyzed that you'll ever do again. But with each
goal that you achieve, then there's new goals that you
need to add to your list. Each of those goals
takes a lot of effort and a lot of expertise
that Shepherd Center was able to provide to help me
(19:52):
achieve those goals. I'll tell you the very first time
that I looked down and I realized that it was
me moving my wrist to not the physical therapist moving
my wrist, that was a pretty profound moment. I got
the right wrist and the right ankle back within days
of each other, and that was really a pivotal moment
(20:18):
standing up, it was a significant achievement. The first time
I fed myself was a significant achievement. First time that
I was told that while you're moving your arms enough
that you might be able to drive a car, and
it sounded scary at the moment, but that was a
(20:39):
huge moment. And when I finally did get to drive
a car on my own and took a bunch of
friends with me to a Braves game for my first
trip in my new car, it was pretty pretty amazing.
(21:01):
You got to realize that it's a long haul your recovery.
I mean, it's been eighteen years now and I'm still
getting improvement, but it's been eighteen years of telling yourself
every day that you're just going to do the best
you can to try to improve. It involves exercise and sacrifice,
(21:24):
but in the long run, I'm in a lot better
place now than I was a year ago, and I'm
in a lot better place a year ago than I
was three years before that. And as long as you
continue to head in the direction that you feel like
you need to go, then you're doing the right thing.
(21:49):
It's hard to tell people exactly what it's like to
be in a wheelchair. When people see someone in a wheelchair,
they always want to help, and sometimes the best way
to help is to let the person in the wheelchair
decide if they need your help at that moment or not.
I think that a good approach to that is let
(22:12):
the person that's in the chair tell you what they need.
You know, if I am trying to do something, it's
okay if I struggle to do it. If I can't
do it, I'll be happy to ask. One of the
(22:33):
things I'm most proud of is that I've been able
to make a new life out of the circumstances that
I've been dealt. My medical training helped, but I realized
I wasn't being fulfilled by what I was doing, and
shortly before COVID started, I decided that I was going
(22:55):
to give an attempt to go to law school and
use my medical background as a lawyer instead of as
a doctor. So I ended up going to law school
passing the bar. At this point, I am helping veterans
do appeals of their compensation for disabilities that they've suffered
(23:18):
in the military. I think, sometimes rightly or wrongly, the
government is looked upon as not taking care of veterans
as best as they should, and I think sometimes we
get it right and sometimes we don't. You can make
that sacrifice that they made a little bit easier to
take if they get what it is that they need
(23:39):
from us. I was able to feed myself again, and
walk again, and drive a car again, a lot of
it out of just sheer determination and hard work. But
I also had the financial means to get the healthcare
and the physical therapy that I needed. When I first
(24:00):
got into my medical practice its first time in my life,
I made a significant amount of income. I was told
by a very savvy insurance agent who could have easily
sold me some life insurance, that I didn't need life
insurance because I didn't have significant others at that time.
(24:20):
I wasn't married, I didn't have kids. But what I
needed was disability insurance. And that was very pivotal moment
in my life. When he convinced me that I needed
to buy enough disability insurance to support myself in the
case that I wasn't able to work again. That was
(24:41):
the best advice I've ever gotten in conversation. It basically
saved my life because it allowed me the financial means
to pay for a lot of the medical problems that
I have, and to pay for caregivers, and to help
pay for the massive expenses that come with an injury
(25:02):
like this. I mean, you're essentially not really working and
you don't have income, but you have massive expenses and
a lot of this is just not affordable. I'm very
fortunate that I had that disability insurance to allow me
to handle this in a little bit better way. It's
(25:23):
really a fault of our entire medical system that people
can suffer injuries and not be able to get the
medical care that we need. I talked to a friend
in Germany about the physical therapy that I needed, and
he was appalled that that's not taken care of you know,
(25:44):
and that now part of our medical system that we
are able to get physical therapy, and if we can't
pay for it, we can't get it. You know, in Germany,
it would just be covered. When I was lying paralyzed
(26:05):
in bed at Shepherd Center and had a lot of
time to think, I got to thinking, you know, I
am so fortunate that I've got to hike to the
bottom of the Grand Canyon several times, and hiked to
see Machu Picchu, and hike in the Alps for ten days,
and hike in Alaska. Those are all things that you know,
(26:26):
I could have put off. I could have delayed them,
and I'm so happy that I grasped those possibilities when
they occurred, did them, and I have this memories. I
probably will never be at the bottom of the Grand
Canyon ever again, because physically to get there would be
(26:47):
almost impossible, but I have those memories and I'll remember
it distinctly as if it were yesterday. I was working
fifty hours a week or more if you got the
time that I was on call, and I was working hard,
I was starting to get high blood pressure. I was
(27:10):
probably working more than I needed to, and maybe I
was on my way to a heart attack or a stroke.
My father died at sixty two of a stroke, and
maybe I was heading down that same road. Perhaps the
spinal cord injury stopped me in my tracks and showed
me a different life path that I ended up being
(27:34):
required to follow because there was no other choice. But
maybe its saved my life. The Grand Canyon is an
amazing place. If you've never been there, it's hard to
(27:57):
even picture it unless you're standing on the edge of it,
going wow, this is amazing. It's a very majestic place,
and it's a very spiritual place. It's a place I
(28:17):
hope to get back to again someday.
Speaker 3 (28:50):
Welcome back.
Speaker 1 (28:50):
This is a Live Again joining me for a conversation
about today's story or my other Alive against story. Producers
Lauren Vogelbaum, Nicholas Dakowski, and Brent Die and I'm your host,
Dan Bush. So, Brent, how long have you known Drew?
Speaker 4 (29:04):
I know Drew from Ultimate Frisbee and he actually is
tied into the story we did about Eileen Murray. She
talks about going to a doctor who told her you
may have cancer, and that doctor was Drew.
Speaker 1 (29:17):
Huh.
Speaker 4 (29:17):
So I've known Drew since the late nineties, and he's always,
even before the accident, just been one of the most welcoming,
inspiring people you could meet. We had a friend who
is also anultimate frisbee player that got struck by lightning.
She survived but was suffered severe brain damage. And when
this happened to Drew, when this happened to Carmen, kind
(29:38):
of the conversation in the community is why do these
things happen to the best people?
Speaker 1 (29:44):
But why do they happen ultimate frisbee players?
Speaker 4 (29:48):
Why do these things happen about frisbee players?
Speaker 5 (29:52):
I mean, I think this happens to bad people too.
We just don't give a shit. That was just like,
oh good, why do things happen to good people?
Speaker 1 (30:01):
And it's, well, they just happened.
Speaker 5 (30:02):
It sucks when they happen to good people. It's really
it's not it doesn't really affect me when they happen
to bad people, like, oh well, okay, shame.
Speaker 2 (30:13):
Gods.
Speaker 1 (30:13):
That is a great perspective. There were three things that
really stood out to me. The first thing, if we want
to just kick off a conversation about this is he
talks about making gains every day and how he had
to work every day and you know, not missing any days.
And it just occurred to me, like, if I apply
the same level of commitment and consistency to the things
(30:34):
that I'm trying to accomplish in my life that you know,
a disabled person has to. Like I keep bringing up
Eric Clarson and he's because his history is so profound
to me. But he said, you know, for some people
in this world, just making breakfast is like climbing Mount
Everest every day. So does it take that kind of
cataclysmic event for me to realize what I do have
(30:55):
and what is worth fighting for and just spend you know,
consistency and commitment and energy every day to to make
those gains, whether it be just to eat breakfast or
whether it be to you know, any other goal that
I have set for myself.
Speaker 4 (31:07):
But yeah, I think knowing Drew from before the accident,
that that's just his persona. You know, like he's he
talks about, you know, being in the Grand Canyon and
I'm not going to let this kill me. I'm not
going to let it. He says he found that little
place that cave to go sit in. It was nice
and cool. He's like, this would be a great place
(31:28):
to die. But I'm not going to let that happen.
And he's not like a hardcore aggressive guy who's, you know,
always going to run into the end zone and win
the game for the ultimate team. I mean, he's he's
a very thoughtful, compassionate, funny, welcoming guy. But you know,
it's probably the same mindset that took him through medical school,
(31:48):
you know, that got him to set up his practice
with you know, It's it's that kind of that got
him to take advantage of life and go do things
like hike in the Grand Canyon to seize the moment
that's in front of you.
Speaker 2 (32:00):
You know.
Speaker 4 (32:01):
So I think maybe that disposition has carried him through
possibly or maybe you get hit with a challenge like
this and you rise to the occasion. But I think
Drew showed the signs of that even before. I remember,
you know, when we would get beers all the time,
and I remember one time just saying, Drew, you know,
because I would see him, I'd go to physical therapy
and document his physical therapy, and I was like, you know, Drew,
(32:22):
I was at the gym and I was just so tired.
I didn't want to do any more. Working out and
I thought of you, and I just it gave me
some energy, and he said, gee, it's great to know
it could be an inspiration for you. So he's always
had this disarming sense of humor that's made him a
delight to be with.
Speaker 1 (32:41):
But yeah, does it take adversity to make us wake
up or get in the fight to live our best
lives or you know.
Speaker 6 (32:48):
It can be the kick in the butt that you need.
Speaker 5 (32:51):
I think that I think that that is a path
toward I guess, enlightenment, but I also think, you know,
just listening like we're doing here, listening to other people's stories,
especially people who may not be like you but have
a human experience, I think that's a kind of a
(33:14):
way forward. I mean, I think we're seeing a lot
of that in the world right now. A lot of
people who aren't being directly affected by big, bad things
that are happening are nonetheless like seeing these things and
going like we have to change on a societal level.
And I think that that also, you know, that also
happens on a personal level when you see those things.
(33:37):
But I do think I mean, if you're comfortable with
the way things are going, or like it's the only
way you've ever known for things to go, Then why
would you change anything?
Speaker 1 (33:49):
You know. That's what I was thinking, is like, if
I play the same amount of discipline he has to
apply to every step of his life. If I play
the same amount of discipline just learning how to make
better pancakes, and I would be the best pancake maker
in the use universe. Right, Yeah, but you know.
Speaker 4 (34:03):
But it's like he said, he hasn't a choice in
the matter, right, he said, I and I think by
making But he did say he could have given up.
Speaker 1 (34:11):
That was his choice.
Speaker 4 (34:12):
And you know, and I think when he talks about
making the decision to do the recovery, and he didn't
know when he's in medical school about neuroplasticity that your
nerves can rebuild these connections. They told him. He they
told him the night that he fell. They told his girlfriend,
he's probably going to die tonight, so call your family.
(34:32):
Then when he made it through the night, they said
he's not going to wake up. Then he woke up.
Then they said he's never going to walk again. And
now he's driving a car. So you know, some of
that's happening almost at a cellular level. When he's out,
you know, when he's unconscious and his body's fighting it,
you know.
Speaker 1 (34:50):
But that's what again, Eric Larsen, I love my polar Explorer,
but he said the best predictor of success or of
survival is not having a choice. Yeah, And so sometime
and like, that's a guy who would put himself into
situations where he didn't have a lifeline and he would
go out on these expeditions where there would be no
rescue possible for about thirty days during his expedition. So
(35:11):
whatever happened come across a polar bear, like there's nobody
coming for you, and you're out in no man's land.
And he just often said that not having a choice
is the best is the is the best predictor of survival.
Speaker 5 (35:26):
I also think the best predictor of survival is to
stay away from polar bears. My choice. I do have
a choice, and I choose to stay home and watch sufferings.
Speaker 1 (35:40):
But he did say that every day he.
Speaker 6 (35:42):
Had to not polar bears.
Speaker 4 (35:44):
Yeah, every day he had to pull himself out of
bed and go to his physical therapy. And I watched
him do his physical therapy and it was hard, you know,
And he's also dealing with things that you don't think about.
He can't feel his feet, so he has to look
where he's walking. I mean, there's all sorts of different
challenges that are embedded in that. But another thing that
(36:05):
he will readily say is he was a doctor who
had a significant savings and he had that excellent advice
from his insurance agent, which was to buy disability insurance.
And he lived six minutes away from Shepherd's Spinal Center,
so he had a lot of things working in his favor.
(36:25):
And you know, I kind of asked him about that,
and he's such an advocate even before the accident, was
always an advocate for a more just fair health care system,
you know. And he's like his friends in Germany, marvel,
They're like, why wouldn't you just be taken care of?
Is in the richest nation in the world. Why would
you have your life destroyed potentially by this? As he
(36:50):
has shown in his own experience, he has still has
so much offer on his own accord, He went and
got a law degree, took his personal experience and is
helping veterans get their benefits. The mood, you know, so
when we cut these people out of our society just
because they don't have the nest egg or the health
insurance or the disability Turrance plan. We're losing a lot,
(37:12):
you know, of course.
Speaker 6 (37:13):
Yeah, every human life is worth it.
Speaker 1 (37:16):
Yeah, And he talks about the failure like somebody else
who's like, oh, physical therapy isn't included. Yeah, no, that's
a special insurance. Like that's another Again, these stories just
constantly pointed the systemic failings of our system.
Speaker 4 (37:31):
Well, on the cost of it, it's one hundred dollars
an hour. He also has to and he has to
do like nine hours of it a week, and then
he has to have somebody stay at his house because
he needs something happens to him. You know, it's it's expensive.
Speaker 1 (37:45):
Yeah, what are people? What are people who don't have
die but type of insurance die?
Speaker 5 (37:51):
The answer is die.
Speaker 6 (37:52):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (37:53):
I mean it was really like I wanted to leave
this in a really positive place and he's very encouraged.
He shows that if you put your mind to it,
you can do it. And I would hate for somebody
to hear this who's going through because I should have
the stats on hand. The number of spinal cord injuries
is pretty astounding in the United States, and nobody has
disability insurance if you don't have disability insurance. But don't
(38:16):
give up. I mean, he's proof that you can make it.
But it is a long slog, you know.
Speaker 6 (38:23):
You know, it's one of the things that I took
away from his story is how resourceful he is. And
that's going back to a lot of what you were
saying about a he had the resources kind of already
set up for him, which is amazing and lucky, but
be just as a human person, he seems really focused
on looking at what he's got to work with and
(38:46):
making it work. And that was something that right just
just really struck me because I'm looking at that going like,
I'm having a much easier time of things, and the
idea of going back to school and learning a new
career exhausts me beyond concept.
Speaker 4 (39:04):
You know.
Speaker 6 (39:04):
I'm kind of in a stage of life where I'm like,
did I feed my cat? Okay? Cool like that, but
but yeah, and I guess another thing that I that
I want to highlight to sort of change the subject.
If anyone wants to bounce off of that great great swiveling,
it goes back to resourcefulness. But I want to emphasize
(39:28):
a point that he made because a dear friend of
mine had a spinal cord injury in high school and
lost the use of her legs and has been in
a wheelchair ever since, and you know, has two amazing
twin kids and is a vibrant human person like anybody else.
And you know, like whenever a person is using any
(39:50):
kind of assistive device, that device is essentially a part
of their body, So don't touch it without their express permission,
the way that you wouldn't touch anyone body without express permission.
And if they're trying to do something, you know you
can ask if they would like help, but you know,
the way that you would ask any human person capable
(40:11):
of speech, Like over the age, you might do something
for a baby without asking express permission because the baby
probably isn't going to give you a good answer. But
you would ask a toddler if they want help getting
that water off of the table. Don't just do it
for a person because they're using an assistive device.
Speaker 4 (40:29):
Yeah, I think, yeah, nobody likes to be told what
to do, and nobody likes to be patronized. And I
think it's you think you're helping, but you know he was.
He was very adamant about that, like that he had.
I said, what is one thing you'd want people to
know what it's like to be in a wheel chairing?
He's like, I would just like them to know that.
Give me my autonomy. Let me make my decision of
(40:50):
when I need something.
Speaker 6 (40:51):
I can tell you as a small bodied human like
I'm five to two, if someone picked me up to
help me reach the water on the table, I would
marterer them with my eyes. I would they would be
dead because my brain waves would kill them.
Speaker 1 (41:05):
Yeah. I met Drew when we went to Grocery on Home.
Grocery on Home as a you know, a cool venue
in Atlanta where you can see interesting bands that show up,
acoustic sets and stuff. But you invited me to come along,
Brent to the Grocery on Home show Withdrew, And I
was so boldest to make a joke when we were coming.
We were approaching the door and that was about to
(41:26):
open the door, and I said, and ritrue, And I said,
can you give that for me?
Speaker 4 (41:35):
But the guy it makes you feel comfortable enough. But
I remember walking out of the hospital that first night,
you know, like, uh, I'm claustrophobic, and if I had,
you know, if I could not move and they shut
the light out and I couldn't, I would just be terrified.
I just remember walking back to my car, just looking
at my legs and just the mobility and just what
(41:57):
a miracle, you know, that we can walk, that we
can see, that we can hear, And how much of
that we take for granted. I mean, what do you
say when we have a healthcare system that leaves people.
Speaker 5 (42:09):
You're not alone. There are so many people suffering in
the exact same ways because of what because of the
way the system is built. There there are so many
people who are going through the exact same thing as
you are. The terrifying thing really is is that we
(42:30):
sort of tend to tuck those people away. We don't
like to think about injury or illness. We don't like
to think about what could happen to us. But like
the truth of the matter is, right now, it's like
this is happening to a lot of people, and you're
not alone. I mean, I think, you know, try to
(42:51):
find other people that this has happened, to try to
talk to them. I mean, like there are advocacy groups
for this kind of thing, and it you know, it's
not over yet for anybody, you know. And the system
(43:11):
is not built for people who are hurt. The system
is not built for people who are weak. The system
is not built for people who are poor. The system
is not built for people who don't who don't aren't
already rich. Cis white men, you know. But there's a
whole lot of people going through what.
Speaker 3 (43:30):
You are going through.
Speaker 4 (43:32):
Well, not only are there a whole lot of people
who get injured every year with a spinal cord injury
or other maladies that can take them out of the economy.
If that's the most important thing in our country, is
how they participate in the economy. What Drew is experiencing
could happen to any one of us, So every one
of us should be an advocate for a better healthcare system.
Speaker 1 (43:52):
Absolutely, yeah, well said.
Speaker 5 (43:57):
Period die that dot.
Speaker 4 (44:02):
I just don't know how to put a spin because
I mean I remember going to see him and just
people who gunshot wounds or falls off a ladder, and
you're just like.
Speaker 1 (44:11):
That, you don't have the resources heat. I just we're
so fragile and we don't think about it. But anytime
you sprain a leg or you know, anything small. What
happens and you're and you're out of you can't use
that capacity that you had for a month or something,
and you're like, oh my god, I had no idea.
That's the only time you identify with that level of
you know, disability. But God forbid, I guess we all
(44:31):
got to go get some disabilities.
Speaker 4 (44:33):
It's vulnerable.
Speaker 5 (44:34):
I love that they're like the current through line in
today's conversations are like.
Speaker 1 (44:39):
It, well, I mean, you're going to get God.
Speaker 7 (44:44):
You're gonna get God, so you might as well appreciate
what you got's now because one day they're gonna fuck you.
What you got to now, what you got right now,
what you can, what you got, love theeople around you,
because what we've learned is maybe nothing.
Speaker 1 (45:11):
He soundly the preacher from Grapes of Ras.
Speaker 4 (45:15):
Found out to get himself some disability in charge, just
in case it gets cut out. I would just say
Drew is an example of somebody doing that. He took
his medical expertise and his life experience and is now
using that. He went and got a law degree and
is now using that to advocate for veterans who have
given for this country. People like Nick who he did
(45:38):
a story on to make sure that they get what
we promised them. And I just think that's for real inspiration,
you know, that this system can be changed, you know,
by people who take part.
Speaker 5 (45:48):
And I think it's I think it's great that like
he didn't just take this as a personal accomplishment. He
took this and he he accomplished something, and then he
looked around and said, how can I help now? And
we need a million of those people like staff.
Speaker 6 (46:06):
But there are there are so many advocacy groups and
so many mutual aid societies and so much help out there,
and a lot of it, for better or worse, is
word of mouth. And so part of what we all
kind of have to do when things are looking this
grim is get out into our community and meet those people,
talk to them about what is already going on, see
how we can help them, and move from there.
Speaker 2 (46:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (46:28):
And I think that anybody who suffers a spinal cord injury,
if they could get into the Shepherd's Spinal Center, it's
incredible what they do. And I do think that they
have ways to get people in there if they don't
have insurance, you know, so.
Speaker 1 (46:42):
We'll put some helpful resources and links. In the show
notes to next time in a Life Again, we meet
Charlie Collins, legally blind since childhood, searching for belonging, and
(47:04):
one night after a concert in New York, climbing on
top of a trained car to prove his self worth.
I grabbed the electricity going into the train system and
shorted out the entire train system, and all of the
electricity went through me. What followed wasn't just a survival,
(47:25):
it was surrender, transformation and a calling to help others.
Speaker 5 (47:29):
I mean, it blows my mind that.
Speaker 3 (47:33):
I didn't die.
Speaker 5 (47:35):
Now I can't help others so much better.
Speaker 1 (47:42):
Our story producers are Dan Bush, Kate Sweeney, Brent die
Nicholas Dakowski, and Lauren Vogelbaum. Music by Ben Lovett, additional
music by Alexander Rodriguez. Our executive producers are Matthew Frederick
and Trevor Young. Special thanks to Alexander Williams for additional
production support. Our studio engineers are Rima L. K Ali
and Noames Griffin. Today's episode was edited by Mike w Anderson,
(48:07):
mixing by Ben Lovett and Alexander Rodriguez. I'm your host,
Dan Bush Alive Again is a production of I R
Radio and Psychopia Pictures. If you have a transformative near
death experience to share, we'd love to hear your story.
Please email us at Alive Again Project at gmail dot com.
That's a l i v e A g A I
(48:30):
N P R O j.
Speaker 3 (48:32):
E c T at gmail dot com.
Speaker 6 (49:00):
Two
You're listening to Alive Again, a production of Psychopia Pictures
and iHeart Podcasts.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
My name is Drew Seibert. On February thirteenth, two thousand
and six, my life changed forever. You go through many
different feelings when this happens. It's very devastating, it's very overwhelming.
You can decide to give up, and there's a lot
(00:37):
of people that give up. But I'm going to do
everything I can to not let that happen.
Speaker 1 (00:49):
Welcome to Alive Again, a podcast that showcases miraculous accounts
of human fragility and resilience from people whose lives were
forever altered after having almost died. These are first hand
accounts of near death experiences and more broadly, brushes with death.
Our mission is simple, find, explore, and share these stories
(01:11):
to remind us all of our shared human condition. Please
keep in mind these stories are true and maybe triggering
for some listener and discretion. As advised. I was hiking
(01:32):
in the Grand Canyon and I almost died. It was
a one hundred and ten degree day, I was in
the direct sun. We had to hike in conditions that
were much more severe than what we had prepared for
(01:54):
because there was a wildfire in the Grand Canyon that year,
and they moved our hike to June or July, and
we were hiking in one hundred and ten degree temperature.
I had been in that environment for several days, gradually
getting more and more dehydrated. So when your body starts
(02:20):
to feel the effects of the heat, the first thing
you notice is fatigue, and it's insidious. It starts off
really slowly, and then you realize that, well, I'm hiking
slower than I normally do, or I'm I'm just I
don't feel as strong as I normally do, And that's
the very first thing you notice.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
And by the time you get to the point where
you're dizzy or you're hallucinating, you're way far gone. It
gradually comes on you and you don't realize it immediately.
Forty pound pack on my back, so my center of
(03:03):
gravity was more to the rear. If I had stood
up straight and then passed out at that point, I
might have fallen over backwards and ended up falling down,
you know, a hundred foot cliff. I leaned into the
(03:25):
hill so I wouldn't fall over backwards down a big cliff,
and then I passed out forward and hit my forehead
on the ground, and I woke up right away. But
I realized that I was in a lot of trouble
because I was by myself and it was there was
no help immediately apparent a friend of mine Tim, He
(03:47):
was forty yards off of the trail off to the left, saying, Hey,
come on over here, there's a cave. It's nice and
cool in there, you can cool down. So I scrambled
across the loose rock bucks got to the cave that
was there, and found out that Tim wasn't there. I
(04:10):
had hallucinated him. Fortunately I didn't hallucinate the cave. The
cave was actually there, and I did sit in the
relative cool for a little while, and I also thought, wow,
what a beautiful place this would be to die, Because
I really thought that it might happen. There wasn't any
panic involved. I was like accepting that if it happens, okay,
(04:36):
but I'm going to do everything I can to battle
that and not let that happen. And finally I got
back out of the cave when looking for my friends.
When I found them, I basically collapsed on the ground
in front of them, and one of them said later
that they had never seen anybody that looked so close
(04:59):
to death in their entire lives. We hiked to the
campsite for the night. I continued to have little, vivid hallucinations.
I woke up in the middle of the night and
I was seeing lights that would flash off and on,
just random lights. And the next day we sat down
(05:23):
and had a conversation with all the ten of us,
but realized that there was no way on Earth I
was going to be able to hike out a mile
up on my own power to get out of the
Grand Canyon alone. So we sent the two best hikers
that we had down to the river. They found a
river raft guide who had a satellite phone. Because cell
(05:44):
phones didn't even exist then, especially not in the Grand Canyon.
They called for a helicopter, and within several hours I
was at the top of the Grand Canyon being treated
at the clinic there for severe hypo nature, which is
low sodium in the blood. I was sweating and not
replacing electrolytes adequately enough, even though I had been trying to.
(06:08):
Somebody had died earlier that week of the same thing,
and so I sat in the emergency room in Las
Vegas for fourteen hours getting ivy fluids, and the doctor
finally said, your sodium is now normal. If you go
down to that Denny's down the street and buy a
Grand Slam breakfast, pour a bunch of salt on it,
and eat the whole thing, I'll let you go. And
(06:30):
so I did, and then I flew home. Home at
that time was Atlanta, where I was a gastronurologist with
a practice in Lawrenceville, Georgia. Gastronurologists is a doctor who
(06:54):
treats all the organs in the digestive system, not only
the digestive tract aspect of it, but also the procedural
aspect of it. It's amazing to be able to remove
someone's calling cancer using a scope and tell them after
the procedure, well, I found that you have cancer, but
you're cured. I grew up in northern Kentucky, which is
(07:17):
just across the Ohio River from Cincinnati. I was inspired
to be a doctor by my mother, who was a nurse.
Some of my earliest memories were of her getting dressed
so that she could go to the shift at the hospital.
I had plans to go to a medical practice in Cincinnati,
(07:37):
but I had heard from another GI fellow who had
interviewed in Atlanta that there was a really busy practice
that needed gastronolich is desperately in the north suburbs of Atlanta.
So I had moved to Atlanta from Indianapolis about six
years before my Grand Canyon misadventure. I worked hard and
(08:05):
I played hard on top of that, and it was
a full life. There was a lot to do and
a lot of fun people to do it with. Around
that time, I also met Mary Helen, who I ended
up dating for several years. She was the one that
would eventually save my life. One weekend, we went to
(08:32):
Alabama to see Mary Helen's niece in a horseback riding event.
She ended up doing very well in the horse show,
but we stayed later that we were wanting to and
we're sort of slow coming back. We stopped and got
some artistical cheese and we did some sight seeing along
the way. By the time we got home, it was
(08:54):
rather late and Mary Ellen didn't want to drive more
to get to her house, so she spent the night.
At some point in the middle of the night, I
got up to use the restroom and I tripped over
something and I fell forward, hit my forehead on the
edge of the marble shower and threw my head back
(09:16):
and broke my neck. I must have hit loudly because
it woke her up in the next room, and she
walks in the room and asks, are you okay? And
I'm like no, I said, I can't breathe. She goes,
(09:37):
do you need an inhaler? And I know, well, do
you need an ambulance?
Speaker 3 (09:43):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (09:43):
And then I guess I stopped breathing, and Mary Helen
was left with somebody not breathing on the floor and
didn't know exactly what to do, but she did everything
so well. She called nine one one. They asked if
I was breathing, She said no. They basically explained to
(10:08):
her how to do mouth to mouth. She started doing
mouth to mouth, but then they said, well, the ambulance
is on the way. She had to run downstairs and
open up the front doors and come back up and
resume breathing for me. And even though she's not really
trained in that, she managed to keep me alive for
(10:33):
the eight to ten minutes that it took for the
ambulance to get to my house. Glad I don't live
forty five minutes away from the hospital, because it probably
would have been a different outcome. And the next thing
I know, I'm waking up three days later on a
ventilator at the hospital with a tube in my mouth,
(10:55):
breathing for me and mouth words what happened around the
two tube? And she goes, you broke your neck and
I responded, oh wow, around the tube silently, and then
I passed back out and didn't wake up again for hours.
And this happened evidently repeatedly for a few days. Mary
(11:17):
Helen went with the ambulance to the hospital. They diagnosed
pretty quickly that I had broken my neck, and they
actually told Mary Helen that night that I wasn't going
to make it through the night and to get hold
of my family and let them know. And then I
made it through the night. And then while he's not
(11:40):
going to wake up, and I woke up and well,
he's paralyzed. He's going to be paralyzed for good. This
all happened on February thirteenth of two thousand and six.
(12:03):
It was the day before Valentine's Day. I had gotten
Mary Helen a Valentine's Day gift, some skincare products that
I knew she liked, but I had to order them
from a friend of ours who sold them, and they
were on back order, so they were not going to
arrive by Valentine's Day. I planned to tell Mary Helen
(12:25):
that her gift was coming, but I never got a
chance to ever tell her that. So I'm at the
hospital in the midst of a three day coma and
gift basket arrives at the hospital and Mary Helen thinks
it's from the big group of friends that are there,
and then she looks at the card and reads the
(12:46):
card and realizes that the card is from me. And
I'm lying there in a coma, and it's probably the
first moment that it really hit her hard that she
was grieving mode.
Speaker 1 (13:06):
It took me.
Speaker 2 (13:07):
Weeks to realize that I was in a really severe situation.
I went through what I sort of called my brain fog.
I couldn't feel my body on my nippoline, and I
couldn't move any of my body except for my shoulders
and my head, and my head was in a neck brace,
so I couldn't even move that much. I wasn't comprehending
(13:34):
the enormity of the changes in my life. At one point,
I remember telling my partners, well, I'll get over this
and I'll be back to work at some point, and
they were like dumbfounded that I would even think that
it's possible. My life changed at that moment for being
a doctor in charge of the care of patients to
(13:55):
being a patient. It's really difficult to realize that you
have needs that you can't provide yourself, and that you
have to rely on other people. If you need to
be turned in bed, or you know, you need some
(14:17):
water and you can't get that yourself, then you need
to be able to get the attention of someone, and
you have trouble even just doing that. You don't realize
just the number of things that you have to come
to groups with caregiving, and where you're going to live,
(14:41):
and how are you going to pay for things, and
what medicines do you need and what kind of exercise
program do you need. It's a big change in your life,
and you don't have a lot of choice in the matter.
You've got to deal with it. The doctor's basically told
me that it would be unlikely that I'd ever be
able to walk again. But the underlying reality is is
(15:06):
that an injury to the spinal cord and a lot
of injuries. You do get recovery and there is regrowth
of nerves, which when I was in medical school we
thought nerves never grow back. Again. They do, but they're
very slow. They call it neuroplasticity, regrowth of the central
(15:29):
nervous system. In order to use that, you have to
actually use it. In order to use it, you have
to go through the motions, So you have to learn
how to walk, You have to learn how to move
your arms, you have to learn how to brush your teeth.
I mean, if you don't do these things, you'll never
train your nerves to allow you to do that again.
(16:02):
I may have had a paralyzed body, but I kept
wanting to do things that would make me better. That
doesn't mean that every single day I wanted to wake
up and go spend three hours exercising. But I managed
to drag myself out and do it pretty much every
single day. Mary Helen, when I hadn't, moved into my
(16:23):
house while I was not there, and that was the plan,
and she went ahead and did it. That first year
of being paralyzed as a quadriplegic is pure hell. If
I can say that word. It's a really devastating thing
to go through. It's very hard emotionally and physically obviously,
(16:48):
and after a year we realized that we, for everyone's sake,
needed to break up, and she moved out at that point.
But she she was my savior that year. I mean,
if I did not have her there to help me
get through this mentally and physically, I'm not sure how
(17:12):
I would have made it. When I bought my house,
I didn't realize that it was within one mile of
Shepherd's Spinal Center, which is one of the top spinal
cord injury rehab the hospitals in the nation, probably one
(17:35):
of the top ten, or maybe one of the top
three or four. And Shepherd is literally within a wheelchair
ride of my house. So it was so close, and
it was just very fortuitous that I happened to buy
a house that close to it without even realizing what
it was at the time. Shepherd Center got started because
(18:00):
as a man named James Shepherd was diving in the
surf in Brazil in the early nineteen seventies and a
wave caught him and knocked his head against the bottom
and he got paralyzed with a spinal cord injury very
similar to mine. Actually, he was stabilized in Brazil, but
(18:21):
there was nowhere in the southeast United States that he
could transfer to. The closest was Craig Hospital in Denver,
and his family realized that the best bet that he
would have to get back to Atlanta would be to
start their own hospital. They actually started it in the
basement of a church with six beds, and those six
(18:44):
beds filled up really quickly, and it's been gradually growing
ever since the early nineteen seventies. So when you're paralyzed,
you actually have to make goals in your improvement, and
the first goals are basically just to start movement again
(19:08):
of any sort. When I first started getting a little
bit of risk in my right side and a little
bit of ankle in my right ankle, then they immediately
started pretty intense physical therapy in order to increase those gains.
Then you start making goals. You're brushing your teeth, feeding yourself,
(19:30):
really basic things that you know you don't think when
you're paralyzed that you'll ever do again. But with each
goal that you achieve, then there's new goals that you
need to add to your list. Each of those goals
takes a lot of effort and a lot of expertise
that Shepherd Center was able to provide to help me
(19:52):
achieve those goals. I'll tell you the very first time
that I looked down and I realized that it was
me moving my wrist to not the physical therapist moving
my wrist, that was a pretty profound moment. I got
the right wrist and the right ankle back within days
of each other, and that was really a pivotal moment
(20:18):
standing up, it was a significant achievement. The first time
I fed myself was a significant achievement. First time that
I was told that while you're moving your arms enough
that you might be able to drive a car, and
it sounded scary at the moment, but that was a
(20:39):
huge moment. And when I finally did get to drive
a car on my own and took a bunch of
friends with me to a Braves game for my first
trip in my new car, it was pretty pretty amazing.
(21:01):
You got to realize that it's a long haul your recovery.
I mean, it's been eighteen years now and I'm still
getting improvement, but it's been eighteen years of telling yourself
every day that you're just going to do the best
you can to try to improve. It involves exercise and sacrifice,
(21:24):
but in the long run, I'm in a lot better
place now than I was a year ago, and I'm
in a lot better place a year ago than I
was three years before that. And as long as you
continue to head in the direction that you feel like
you need to go, then you're doing the right thing.
(21:49):
It's hard to tell people exactly what it's like to
be in a wheelchair. When people see someone in a wheelchair,
they always want to help, and sometimes the best way
to help is to let the person in the wheelchair
decide if they need your help at that moment or not.
I think that a good approach to that is let
(22:12):
the person that's in the chair tell you what they need.
You know, if I am trying to do something, it's
okay if I struggle to do it. If I can't
do it, I'll be happy to ask. One of the
(22:33):
things I'm most proud of is that I've been able
to make a new life out of the circumstances that
I've been dealt. My medical training helped, but I realized
I wasn't being fulfilled by what I was doing, and
shortly before COVID started, I decided that I was going
(22:55):
to give an attempt to go to law school and
use my medical background as a lawyer instead of as
a doctor. So I ended up going to law school
passing the bar. At this point, I am helping veterans
do appeals of their compensation for disabilities that they've suffered
(23:18):
in the military. I think, sometimes rightly or wrongly, the
government is looked upon as not taking care of veterans
as best as they should, and I think sometimes we
get it right and sometimes we don't. You can make
that sacrifice that they made a little bit easier to
take if they get what it is that they need
(23:39):
from us. I was able to feed myself again, and
walk again, and drive a car again, a lot of
it out of just sheer determination and hard work. But
I also had the financial means to get the healthcare
and the physical therapy that I needed. When I first
(24:00):
got into my medical practice its first time in my life,
I made a significant amount of income. I was told
by a very savvy insurance agent who could have easily
sold me some life insurance, that I didn't need life
insurance because I didn't have significant others at that time.
(24:20):
I wasn't married, I didn't have kids. But what I
needed was disability insurance. And that was very pivotal moment
in my life. When he convinced me that I needed
to buy enough disability insurance to support myself in the
case that I wasn't able to work again. That was
(24:41):
the best advice I've ever gotten in conversation. It basically
saved my life because it allowed me the financial means
to pay for a lot of the medical problems that
I have, and to pay for caregivers, and to help
pay for the massive expenses that come with an injury
(25:02):
like this. I mean, you're essentially not really working and
you don't have income, but you have massive expenses and
a lot of this is just not affordable. I'm very
fortunate that I had that disability insurance to allow me
to handle this in a little bit better way. It's
(25:23):
really a fault of our entire medical system that people
can suffer injuries and not be able to get the
medical care that we need. I talked to a friend
in Germany about the physical therapy that I needed, and
he was appalled that that's not taken care of you know,
(25:44):
and that now part of our medical system that we
are able to get physical therapy, and if we can't
pay for it, we can't get it. You know, in Germany,
it would just be covered. When I was lying paralyzed
(26:05):
in bed at Shepherd Center and had a lot of
time to think, I got to thinking, you know, I
am so fortunate that I've got to hike to the
bottom of the Grand Canyon several times, and hiked to
see Machu Picchu, and hike in the Alps for ten days,
and hike in Alaska. Those are all things that you know,
(26:26):
I could have put off. I could have delayed them,
and I'm so happy that I grasped those possibilities when
they occurred, did them, and I have this memories. I
probably will never be at the bottom of the Grand
Canyon ever again, because physically to get there would be
(26:47):
almost impossible, but I have those memories and I'll remember
it distinctly as if it were yesterday. I was working
fifty hours a week or more if you got the
time that I was on call, and I was working hard,
I was starting to get high blood pressure. I was
(27:10):
probably working more than I needed to, and maybe I
was on my way to a heart attack or a stroke.
My father died at sixty two of a stroke, and
maybe I was heading down that same road. Perhaps the
spinal cord injury stopped me in my tracks and showed
me a different life path that I ended up being
(27:34):
required to follow because there was no other choice. But
maybe its saved my life. The Grand Canyon is an
amazing place. If you've never been there, it's hard to
(27:57):
even picture it unless you're standing on the edge of it,
going wow, this is amazing. It's a very majestic place,
and it's a very spiritual place. It's a place I
(28:17):
hope to get back to again someday.
Speaker 3 (28:50):
Welcome back.
Speaker 1 (28:50):
This is a Live Again joining me for a conversation
about today's story or my other Alive against story. Producers
Lauren Vogelbaum, Nicholas Dakowski, and Brent Die and I'm your host,
Dan Bush. So, Brent, how long have you known Drew?
Speaker 4 (29:04):
I know Drew from Ultimate Frisbee and he actually is
tied into the story we did about Eileen Murray. She
talks about going to a doctor who told her you
may have cancer, and that doctor was Drew.
Speaker 1 (29:17):
Huh.
Speaker 4 (29:17):
So I've known Drew since the late nineties, and he's always,
even before the accident, just been one of the most welcoming,
inspiring people you could meet. We had a friend who
is also anultimate frisbee player that got struck by lightning.
She survived but was suffered severe brain damage. And when
this happened to Drew, when this happened to Carmen, kind
(29:38):
of the conversation in the community is why do these
things happen to the best people?
Speaker 1 (29:44):
But why do they happen ultimate frisbee players?
Speaker 4 (29:48):
Why do these things happen about frisbee players?
Speaker 5 (29:52):
I mean, I think this happens to bad people too.
We just don't give a shit. That was just like,
oh good, why do things happen to good people?
Speaker 1 (30:01):
And it's, well, they just happened.
Speaker 5 (30:02):
It sucks when they happen to good people. It's really
it's not it doesn't really affect me when they happen
to bad people, like, oh well, okay, shame.
Speaker 2 (30:13):
Gods.
Speaker 1 (30:13):
That is a great perspective. There were three things that
really stood out to me. The first thing, if we want
to just kick off a conversation about this is he
talks about making gains every day and how he had
to work every day and you know, not missing any days.
And it just occurred to me, like, if I apply
the same level of commitment and consistency to the things
(30:34):
that I'm trying to accomplish in my life that you know,
a disabled person has to. Like I keep bringing up
Eric Clarson and he's because his history is so profound
to me. But he said, you know, for some people
in this world, just making breakfast is like climbing Mount
Everest every day. So does it take that kind of
cataclysmic event for me to realize what I do have
(30:55):
and what is worth fighting for and just spend you know,
consistency and commitment and energy every day to to make
those gains, whether it be just to eat breakfast or
whether it be to you know, any other goal that
I have set for myself.
Speaker 4 (31:07):
But yeah, I think knowing Drew from before the accident,
that that's just his persona. You know, like he's he
talks about, you know, being in the Grand Canyon and
I'm not going to let this kill me. I'm not
going to let it. He says he found that little
place that cave to go sit in. It was nice
and cool. He's like, this would be a great place
(31:28):
to die. But I'm not going to let that happen.
And he's not like a hardcore aggressive guy who's, you know,
always going to run into the end zone and win
the game for the ultimate team. I mean, he's he's
a very thoughtful, compassionate, funny, welcoming guy. But you know,
it's probably the same mindset that took him through medical school,
(31:48):
you know, that got him to set up his practice
with you know, It's it's that kind of that got
him to take advantage of life and go do things
like hike in the Grand Canyon to seize the moment
that's in front of you.
Speaker 2 (32:00):
You know.
Speaker 4 (32:01):
So I think maybe that disposition has carried him through
possibly or maybe you get hit with a challenge like
this and you rise to the occasion. But I think
Drew showed the signs of that even before. I remember,
you know, when we would get beers all the time,
and I remember one time just saying, Drew, you know,
because I would see him, I'd go to physical therapy
and document his physical therapy, and I was like, you know, Drew,
(32:22):
I was at the gym and I was just so tired.
I didn't want to do any more. Working out and
I thought of you, and I just it gave me
some energy, and he said, gee, it's great to know
it could be an inspiration for you. So he's always
had this disarming sense of humor that's made him a
delight to be with.
Speaker 1 (32:41):
But yeah, does it take adversity to make us wake
up or get in the fight to live our best
lives or you know.
Speaker 6 (32:48):
It can be the kick in the butt that you need.
Speaker 5 (32:51):
I think that I think that that is a path
toward I guess, enlightenment, but I also think, you know,
just listening like we're doing here, listening to other people's stories,
especially people who may not be like you but have
a human experience, I think that's a kind of a
(33:14):
way forward. I mean, I think we're seeing a lot
of that in the world right now. A lot of
people who aren't being directly affected by big, bad things
that are happening are nonetheless like seeing these things and
going like we have to change on a societal level.
And I think that that also, you know, that also
happens on a personal level when you see those things.
(33:37):
But I do think I mean, if you're comfortable with
the way things are going, or like it's the only
way you've ever known for things to go, Then why
would you change anything?
Speaker 1 (33:49):
You know. That's what I was thinking, is like, if
I play the same amount of discipline he has to
apply to every step of his life. If I play
the same amount of discipline just learning how to make
better pancakes, and I would be the best pancake maker
in the use universe. Right, Yeah, but you know.
Speaker 4 (34:03):
But it's like he said, he hasn't a choice in
the matter, right, he said, I and I think by
making But he did say he could have given up.
Speaker 1 (34:11):
That was his choice.
Speaker 4 (34:12):
And you know, and I think when he talks about
making the decision to do the recovery, and he didn't
know when he's in medical school about neuroplasticity that your
nerves can rebuild these connections. They told him. He they
told him the night that he fell. They told his girlfriend,
he's probably going to die tonight, so call your family.
(34:32):
Then when he made it through the night, they said
he's not going to wake up. Then he woke up.
Then they said he's never going to walk again. And
now he's driving a car. So you know, some of
that's happening almost at a cellular level. When he's out,
you know, when he's unconscious and his body's fighting it,
you know.
Speaker 1 (34:50):
But that's what again, Eric Larsen, I love my polar Explorer,
but he said the best predictor of success or of
survival is not having a choice. Yeah, And so sometime
and like, that's a guy who would put himself into
situations where he didn't have a lifeline and he would
go out on these expeditions where there would be no
rescue possible for about thirty days during his expedition. So
(35:11):
whatever happened come across a polar bear, like there's nobody
coming for you, and you're out in no man's land.
And he just often said that not having a choice
is the best is the is the best predictor of survival.
Speaker 5 (35:26):
I also think the best predictor of survival is to
stay away from polar bears. My choice. I do have
a choice, and I choose to stay home and watch sufferings.
Speaker 1 (35:40):
But he did say that every day he.
Speaker 6 (35:42):
Had to not polar bears.
Speaker 4 (35:44):
Yeah, every day he had to pull himself out of
bed and go to his physical therapy. And I watched
him do his physical therapy and it was hard, you know,
And he's also dealing with things that you don't think about.
He can't feel his feet, so he has to look
where he's walking. I mean, there's all sorts of different
challenges that are embedded in that. But another thing that
(36:05):
he will readily say is he was a doctor who
had a significant savings and he had that excellent advice
from his insurance agent, which was to buy disability insurance.
And he lived six minutes away from Shepherd's Spinal Center,
so he had a lot of things working in his favor.
(36:25):
And you know, I kind of asked him about that,
and he's such an advocate even before the accident, was
always an advocate for a more just fair health care system,
you know. And he's like his friends in Germany, marvel,
They're like, why wouldn't you just be taken care of?
Is in the richest nation in the world. Why would
you have your life destroyed potentially by this? As he
(36:50):
has shown in his own experience, he has still has
so much offer on his own accord, He went and
got a law degree, took his personal experience and is
helping veterans get their benefits. The mood, you know, so
when we cut these people out of our society just
because they don't have the nest egg or the health
insurance or the disability Turrance plan. We're losing a lot,
(37:12):
you know, of course.
Speaker 6 (37:13):
Yeah, every human life is worth it.
Speaker 1 (37:16):
Yeah, And he talks about the failure like somebody else
who's like, oh, physical therapy isn't included. Yeah, no, that's
a special insurance. Like that's another Again, these stories just
constantly pointed the systemic failings of our system.
Speaker 4 (37:31):
Well, on the cost of it, it's one hundred dollars
an hour. He also has to and he has to
do like nine hours of it a week, and then
he has to have somebody stay at his house because
he needs something happens to him. You know, it's it's expensive.
Speaker 1 (37:45):
Yeah, what are people? What are people who don't have
die but type of insurance die?
Speaker 5 (37:51):
The answer is die.
Speaker 6 (37:52):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (37:53):
I mean it was really like I wanted to leave
this in a really positive place and he's very encouraged.
He shows that if you put your mind to it,
you can do it. And I would hate for somebody
to hear this who's going through because I should have
the stats on hand. The number of spinal cord injuries
is pretty astounding in the United States, and nobody has
disability insurance if you don't have disability insurance. But don't
(38:16):
give up. I mean, he's proof that you can make it.
But it is a long slog, you know.
Speaker 6 (38:23):
You know, it's one of the things that I took
away from his story is how resourceful he is. And
that's going back to a lot of what you were
saying about a he had the resources kind of already
set up for him, which is amazing and lucky, but
be just as a human person, he seems really focused
on looking at what he's got to work with and
(38:46):
making it work. And that was something that right just
just really struck me because I'm looking at that going like,
I'm having a much easier time of things, and the
idea of going back to school and learning a new
career exhausts me beyond concept.
Speaker 4 (39:04):
You know.
Speaker 6 (39:04):
I'm kind of in a stage of life where I'm like,
did I feed my cat? Okay? Cool like that, but
but yeah, and I guess another thing that I that
I want to highlight to sort of change the subject.
If anyone wants to bounce off of that great great swiveling,
it goes back to resourcefulness. But I want to emphasize
(39:28):
a point that he made because a dear friend of
mine had a spinal cord injury in high school and
lost the use of her legs and has been in
a wheelchair ever since, and you know, has two amazing
twin kids and is a vibrant human person like anybody else.
And you know, like whenever a person is using any
(39:50):
kind of assistive device, that device is essentially a part
of their body, So don't touch it without their express permission,
the way that you wouldn't touch anyone body without express permission.
And if they're trying to do something, you know you
can ask if they would like help, but you know,
the way that you would ask any human person capable
(40:11):
of speech, Like over the age, you might do something
for a baby without asking express permission because the baby
probably isn't going to give you a good answer. But
you would ask a toddler if they want help getting
that water off of the table. Don't just do it
for a person because they're using an assistive device.
Speaker 4 (40:29):
Yeah, I think, yeah, nobody likes to be told what
to do, and nobody likes to be patronized. And I
think it's you think you're helping, but you know he was.
He was very adamant about that, like that he had.
I said, what is one thing you'd want people to
know what it's like to be in a wheel chairing?
He's like, I would just like them to know that.
Give me my autonomy. Let me make my decision of
(40:50):
when I need something.
Speaker 6 (40:51):
I can tell you as a small bodied human like
I'm five to two, if someone picked me up to
help me reach the water on the table, I would
marterer them with my eyes. I would they would be
dead because my brain waves would kill them.
Speaker 1 (41:05):
Yeah. I met Drew when we went to Grocery on Home.
Grocery on Home as a you know, a cool venue
in Atlanta where you can see interesting bands that show up,
acoustic sets and stuff. But you invited me to come along,
Brent to the Grocery on Home show Withdrew, And I
was so boldest to make a joke when we were coming.
We were approaching the door and that was about to
(41:26):
open the door, and I said, and ritrue, And I said,
can you give that for me?
Speaker 4 (41:35):
But the guy it makes you feel comfortable enough. But
I remember walking out of the hospital that first night,
you know, like, uh, I'm claustrophobic, and if I had,
you know, if I could not move and they shut
the light out and I couldn't, I would just be terrified.
I just remember walking back to my car, just looking
at my legs and just the mobility and just what
(41:57):
a miracle, you know, that we can walk, that we
can see, that we can hear, And how much of
that we take for granted. I mean, what do you
say when we have a healthcare system that leaves people.
Speaker 5 (42:09):
You're not alone. There are so many people suffering in
the exact same ways because of what because of the
way the system is built. There there are so many
people who are going through the exact same thing as
you are. The terrifying thing really is is that we
(42:30):
sort of tend to tuck those people away. We don't
like to think about injury or illness. We don't like
to think about what could happen to us. But like
the truth of the matter is, right now, it's like
this is happening to a lot of people, and you're
not alone. I mean, I think, you know, try to
(42:51):
find other people that this has happened, to try to
talk to them. I mean, like there are advocacy groups
for this kind of thing, and it you know, it's
not over yet for anybody, you know. And the system
(43:11):
is not built for people who are hurt. The system
is not built for people who are weak. The system
is not built for people who are poor. The system
is not built for people who don't who don't aren't
already rich. Cis white men, you know. But there's a
whole lot of people going through what.
Speaker 3 (43:30):
You are going through.
Speaker 4 (43:32):
Well, not only are there a whole lot of people
who get injured every year with a spinal cord injury
or other maladies that can take them out of the economy.
If that's the most important thing in our country, is
how they participate in the economy. What Drew is experiencing
could happen to any one of us, So every one
of us should be an advocate for a better healthcare system.
Speaker 1 (43:52):
Absolutely, yeah, well said.
Speaker 5 (43:57):
Period die that dot.
Speaker 4 (44:02):
I just don't know how to put a spin because
I mean I remember going to see him and just
people who gunshot wounds or falls off a ladder, and
you're just like.
Speaker 1 (44:11):
That, you don't have the resources heat. I just we're
so fragile and we don't think about it. But anytime
you sprain a leg or you know, anything small. What
happens and you're and you're out of you can't use
that capacity that you had for a month or something,
and you're like, oh my god, I had no idea.
That's the only time you identify with that level of
you know, disability. But God forbid, I guess we all
(44:31):
got to go get some disabilities.
Speaker 4 (44:33):
It's vulnerable.
Speaker 5 (44:34):
I love that they're like the current through line in
today's conversations are like.
Speaker 1 (44:39):
It, well, I mean, you're going to get God.
Speaker 7 (44:44):
You're gonna get God, so you might as well appreciate
what you got's now because one day they're gonna fuck you.
What you got to now, what you got right now,
what you can, what you got, love theeople around you,
because what we've learned is maybe nothing.
Speaker 1 (45:11):
He soundly the preacher from Grapes of Ras.
Speaker 4 (45:15):
Found out to get himself some disability in charge, just
in case it gets cut out. I would just say
Drew is an example of somebody doing that. He took
his medical expertise and his life experience and is now
using that. He went and got a law degree and
is now using that to advocate for veterans who have
given for this country. People like Nick who he did
(45:38):
a story on to make sure that they get what
we promised them. And I just think that's for real inspiration,
you know, that this system can be changed, you know,
by people who take part.
Speaker 5 (45:48):
And I think it's I think it's great that like
he didn't just take this as a personal accomplishment. He
took this and he he accomplished something, and then he
looked around and said, how can I help now? And
we need a million of those people like staff.
Speaker 6 (46:06):
But there are there are so many advocacy groups and
so many mutual aid societies and so much help out there,
and a lot of it, for better or worse, is
word of mouth. And so part of what we all
kind of have to do when things are looking this
grim is get out into our community and meet those people,
talk to them about what is already going on, see
how we can help them, and move from there.
Speaker 2 (46:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (46:28):
And I think that anybody who suffers a spinal cord injury,
if they could get into the Shepherd's Spinal Center, it's
incredible what they do. And I do think that they
have ways to get people in there if they don't
have insurance, you know, so.
Speaker 1 (46:42):
We'll put some helpful resources and links. In the show
notes to next time in a Life Again, we meet
Charlie Collins, legally blind since childhood, searching for belonging, and
(47:04):
one night after a concert in New York, climbing on
top of a trained car to prove his self worth.
I grabbed the electricity going into the train system and
shorted out the entire train system, and all of the
electricity went through me. What followed wasn't just a survival,
(47:25):
it was surrender, transformation and a calling to help others.
Speaker 5 (47:29):
I mean, it blows my mind that.
Speaker 3 (47:33):
I didn't die.
Speaker 5 (47:35):
Now I can't help others so much better.
Speaker 1 (47:42):
Our story producers are Dan Bush, Kate Sweeney, Brent die
Nicholas Dakowski, and Lauren Vogelbaum. Music by Ben Lovett, additional
music by Alexander Rodriguez. Our executive producers are Matthew Frederick
and Trevor Young. Special thanks to Alexander Williams for additional
production support. Our studio engineers are Rima L. K Ali
and Noames Griffin. Today's episode was edited by Mike w Anderson,
(48:07):
mixing by Ben Lovett and Alexander Rodriguez. I'm your host,
Dan Bush Alive Again is a production of I R
Radio and Psychopia Pictures. If you have a transformative near
death experience to share, we'd love to hear your story.
Please email us at Alive Again Project at gmail dot com.
That's a l i v e A g A I
(48:30):
N P R O j.
Speaker 3 (48:32):
E c T at gmail dot com.
Speaker 6 (49:00):
Two
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