Download Your Free Report of "The 10 Most Important Questions to Ask a Personal Injury Lawyer" and receive my monthly newsletter!
An easy, informative how-to story book for lawyers, people with serious injuries and their friends and family, and for people who want to know what it is really like to fight a personal injury battle in court and how to manage after the case is over.
Back and spinal cord injuries can often result in complete or partial paralysis. Paralysis occurs when the spinal cord is damaged or torn. Think of the spinal cord as the “electric wire” that carries messages to and from the brain. When that wire gets damaged, those messages may no longer travel to and from the brain like they should – so your body may not respond like it did before the injury.
There are two types of paralysis:
- Quadriplegia occurs when a person has significant paralysis of both arms and legs.
- Paraplegia occurs when an injury causes paralysis in the lower half of the body.
Not everyone is affected the same way when an injury occurs. The effect an injury has depends, in a large part, on where on the spinal cord or back that the injury occurs and how severe the injury is. The severity of the injury can also determine whether paralysis will be temporary or is a permanent disability.
Below is an excerpt from Albert Stark’s “Insider Secrets to Winning Your Personal Injury Battle” chronicling one person’s struggle with a spinal cord injury.
Skylar paused and collected her thoughts. “When the doctors first told me about the extent of my injuries I never thought, ‘This will be my life.’ I thought that within a month I would be better. When I heard I was going to Kessler, I thought it was going to be like in Harry Potter, with all the patients in wheelchairs hurrying every which way. I’m not going to let my injuries deter me. I was used to training hard for the band. I’m gonna use my competitive drive to recover as much as I can.”
During the early stages of Skylar’s case, Peter Antonuccio, a certified videographer, videotaped the staff at Kessler Rehabilitation Institute teaching Skylar to regain some of the independence she had lost. He filmed a physical therapy session that helped develop muscles to compensate somewhat for the parts of her body that didn’t work anymore and drills for her arms—special boxing exercises and arms circles. In an occupational therapy session, Skylar struggled to pick things up, dress herself, and use a slide board, a special elongated piece of wood with a hole at either end. One end is positioned on a bed or sofa and the patient is then slid along the board on her backside to a wheelchair.
Skylar, an incomplete quadriplegic, teaches how to maintain a positive attitude, how to weather the downward spirals. She tells you what she went through on the way to court, winning millions of dollars. Her life, adapting to her disabilities, going to college, having a service dog, teaches invaluable lessons to persons with severe back and spinal cord injuries.
