Miracles, Gifts and Gratitude: Choosing Determination over Death

I dedicate this to MADD Mothers Against Drunk Driving. Amy Lemire Simatos

As I prepared for my talk on Sunday, Fr Don let me know that the service was about celebrating St. Luke and the power of healing. Who is St. Luke, and what do I have I common with him? I asked myself.  I discovered that St. Luke was a physician. He included 6 miracles in his wok including the coming of the holy spirit, overcoming struggles and triumphing. Then it hit me – I had a lot in common with St. Luke.  The thoughts of St. Luke and healing brought me back to the year 1977. I, too, triumphed over struggles.  My struggle was different than the struggles of St. Luke. It was a triumph of life over death.  Through the help of doctors, nurses, and medical staff, I was healed and lived to tell my story.   I remember it just like it was yesterday.  

One day, I woke up and asked myself ‘where am I,’ as I looked around the hospital room.  My mother was there.  She explained that we had been in a terrible car accident.  It was caused by a drunk driver.  We had left Six Flags St Louis, and as traffic was heavy, we took the outer road of highway 44.  Then it happened - the drunk driver drove straight towards us, a car with my mom, my 2 sisters, brother, and 2 children who lived next door to us. To avoid a head on collision, and all of us being killed mom dodged him and hit a fence.  She went on to explain that I had been injured, in addition the cast on my left arm, my head and face had been injured.  I remember thinking it was probably a couple bruises and scratches.  Then I asked mom ‘can I see my face?’  She replied, ‘I need to ask the Dr.’  Then it hit me-I knew something was wrong.  As she left the room, I pulled the dumb waiter close to myself, I opened the drawer, and there was a mirrored surface.  I couldn’t believe what I saw.  My face looked worse than anything I had ever suspected.  ? of my nose was missing, there were scars all over my face, especially on my left cheek where the impact occurred.  My head had been shaved.  My long brown hair was gone.  I later learned that was because my head had been bandaged as I was in a medicated coma for weeks and I was being monitored for brain damage.  I had over 500 stitches in my face, I had been in surgery for over 8 hours and my skull had been re wired back together. My left wrist was broken. To say I was in a state of shock was an understatement. After seeing my face, I secretly wished I was dead.  The physical healing had begun and continued as I went through decades of cosmetic/reconstructive surgery on my face.  The psychological healing was still a future event.  How did I heal psychologically?  Three words: miracles, gifts, and gratitude.  

The word miracle means many things to many people. For me, it started with the experience in 1977.  To say that it is a miracle that I am alive today and didn’t suffer brain damage is true. My family had been told that even if I did survive the surgery, it was likely I would be blind, or deaf.  The second miracle that happened to me was a gift from my grandmother Memere (my Dads mother).  She gave me a book a month or so after the accident “The Value of Determination-The story of Helen Keller.” I had never known or understood what the word determination meant. But I learned quickly from this book. It meant to me: develop a positive attitude and have a spirit to persevere no matter what the circumstances or what was happening around me. To this day, determination is one of my core values, and I thank my grandmother for teaching me this at such a young age. It helped me get through years of cosmetic and reconstructive surgery on my face. It also gave me courage to continue no matter what. The other miracle that I inherited was the gift of mental strength. That is from my grandmother Nana, who also was a nurse. I didn’t know what perseverance was until I had gone through the experience. Determination and courage helped me with the psychological healing that had to occur after the accident. Last, the miracle of faith. My mom, dad, family, friends, always surrounding me with your love and caring gave me the faith to be strong. And my grandfather, an episcopal minister, helped me see the value of faith at very young age. Faith can get you through the darkest times, and there’s always a light at the end of the tunnel.  I continue my journey in faith through the Episcopal church.

The next thing that I learned was the gift of personal power and self-discovery from this event. One of my mentors, Tony Robbins has always said the only meeting that we give to events is the meaning that we create ourselves. During my teenager years admit that I was angry, and I was rebellious. I got speeding tickets, wrecked cars, drank, and overall, was pretty reckless. It was my way of acting out. But my friend Matt invited me to a seminar called Lifespring. I was a college student at the time at the University of Kansas and I was only 18 years old when I went to this workshop. It got me to see that it is not was on the outside is important, but this is what is on the inside that really counts. And also, every one of us has gone through something, maybe it’s an accident, violated trust, abuse, poverty, but we can look at these events as ways to make us stronger and to help us define who we really are, and it could be away that we help others. Through this workshop and many others that followed, I became a student of human potential, and able to see it is only our past, stories, and limiting belief systems that get on the way of who we really are and what we want to achieve.  From the seminars, I decided to let all of that though. I came to the realization that my purpose in life is to create joy in others, and I created a life contract in the advanced Lifespring workshop, “I am a beautiful, passionate, and powerful woman.”  

Finally, the power. Fear and gratitude cannot exist. Who would I be today, but not gone this when I was nine? I do not think I will would have the courage, determination, and personal power today in my life. Also, I smile to myself and know that it is no accident that I spent much of my career selling to clinical staff in hospitals providing them with products and services so that they could help other patients like me survive. Today, my drive and desire to teach training and help other people get to where they want to be in their life, business, and speaking, defines who I really am. I realize that what may appear to be a hardship in my life is sometimes a gift in disguise. I’m often told that I am a positive, inspirational person, is hard to see that myself, but I know it was a result of all of the work that I did on myself after the car accident in 1977 and also making the decision to not allow events, people, circumstances, stand in the way of me getting I want to do to serve others, to make this world a better place.

Today, as you go through your day, reflect upon the following question: what miracles, gifts, and events do I have to be grateful for? How did these events shape who I really am today? How can I help other people be strong as a result of my personal life experiences? I’m confident that if you look at events, circumstances, and what could be appearing to be a hardship as a gift, you too, will be filled with joy, live a happy life, and the world will be a better place.