Ed C.

Like most of us 2020 started off like a year just like the rest. January was a calm casual month typical for January everyone recovering from the holidays with family and friends. February changed my life. The beginning of January I lost my only brother to a brain aneurysm two weeks later I lost the love of my life to colon cancer and two weeks after that I lost my mother from internal bleeding. It was a month like never before, it was a month no I hope nobody ever has to go through! I struggled, Lord how I struggled, to try to understand why my whole family was ripped away from me within 6 weeks? I was broken, badly broken, and he lost all my life's purpose. Couple months later in April of 2020, some friends of mine took a two hour ride on their bikes up here to take me out on a ride together like old times to try to heal my soul. Another day that changed my life. On a ride to the coast we had lunch and on the way back a drunk driver blew through a red light took me off my Harley and shattered my femur above the knee. I woke up to them talking about me in the hospital and discussing whether or not the amputate my leg. They decided they could try to reconstruct it instead and told me I'd never walk again unassisted. They were wrong. I ended up in a rehabilitation center alone without my family to support me because covid is now hit full force. I couldn't understand why or what I done wrong people left here alone like this. Why couldn't I just die? That's why I wanted to be with my family and the love of my life for 35 years. I thought about so many things that were wrong and crimes against the Lord. In my mind taking my own life was not an option because it surely meant that I would never be with my family again so I had no choice but to push forward alone. As I started to heal going into to be physical therapy I had no motivation and no purpose for still being here yet had crossed my mind. As I was proving The Specialist wrong and learning to walk again I was getting stronger and stronger. One day I ran across a friend I hadn't seen in quite some time who told me she had started working in the behavioral health field helping people who are struggling with behavioral issues. She told me that they needed somebody to work at the facility she worked at and said she'd put a good word in for me. I jumped through hoops and did everything I needed to do to get hired at that facility. As I started to help those who needed that help and got my certifications I started to feel more complete and so I still had a purpose in this life. I'm still working in the behavioral health field I've worked in the drug and alcohol addiction programs, in the behavioral health programs and I'm currently seeking a position in a facility where I can help both. I might have found my life's purpose. I guess the moral to story is that sometimes even in our darkest hours there's always a glimmer a bite you can lead us out of the darkness we place yourself in, life places this in willingly or not, and if we keep our eyes ahead of us and offer the handout to help people up as we pass them by instead of just ignoring them because of our own problems we can eventually understand what it is we were meant to do while we were here. Thank you for listening to my story it wasn't easy to tell, and there are plenty of Tears while I told it. But if it helps one person, just one person, I'll said as many tears until I can't talk anymore. Stay strong, Don't Give Up come and believe in your heart!