First I want to say I listen to your podcast at work. It helps me get trough the day, I also want to thank you both and everyone else out there who served or is in the military right now for your service.
My story, I’m 24 now and I always wanted to go into law enforcement. I’m still trying to get hired on a police department. When I was in high school I was on break and my family went to the sand dunes. My brother and I were at the track they made and it started to get dark. So on the way back we were full throttle 5 gear just going like a bat out of hell. My ATV or (quad) was a bit too big for me. But I always liked the challenge so what the hell right. While we were racing back to our camp. Someone made a makeshift jump out of sand and didn’t see it until it was too late. I had two choices. Turn and roll my quad. Or hit it head on and see what happened. I hit it head on and it launched me about 15 feet and my quad was flipping/Rolling toward me. My quad landed on my back and fractured my back in 3 places. I remembered hearing a scream from a different camp and I woke up to a guy standing over me. He flipped my quad back over and while my adrenaline was still spiked. I got back on and drove my quad back to camp. At first we didn’t know what was wrong, my back was to swollen for an x-ray. ( per the doctor). I was in pain for about 3 months after the accident. My parents just kept telling me “ice and Advil” (now a running joke in the family) finally my dad said let’s take another x-ray and see what happens. It showed 3 fractured vertebrae. I live in pain everyday of my life. And yes it would be very easy to say “I quit” but my goals and dreams are to become a police officer, then into swat. So I have to motivate myself with that every single day. Because quitting is never and option for me.
Thanks for reading. And I hope you guys enjoyed.
Thank you again for all you do.