Acceptance: Let Go of Wishing Things Were Different‪.‬ Tom Nikkola | VIGOR Training

The following is an excerpt from a draft of a book I'm working on. It's about my recovery from a broken neck and spinal cord injury, but also much more than that. As I continue to work on it, I may include other writings and ramblings here on my blog. They may or may not make it into the final draft. If you're a Nikkola Newsletter subscriber, you'll be the first to know when the book is finished.



“I’m going over the handlebars,” I thought as my front bike tire dropped off the edge of a three-foot skinny bridge. A fraction of a second later, my front tire hit the ground, causing my bike to catapult me around the tire, throwing me head-first into the ground. My head hit the ground, and then my neck absorbed the force from the rest of my body, moving in the same direction as my head. I saw darkness and then a flash of light. And then I was lying flat on my back. My hands moved. My legs did not. I had no feeling below my waist. I instantly knew this was a bad situation.



I told our grandson Asher to get Grandma Vanessa, who was ahead of us on the trail. She heard me, threw her bike into the woods, and ran back to where I lay. She quickly sprung to action, calling 911 and flagging down other riders to help.



As I lay there, I knew I’d sustained a serious neck injury and that there was a good chance I’d never walk again.



I didn’t feel sad or angry, or discouraged. I didn't panic, as I knew that would only make things worse, not to mention that it would scare our grandson.



Once Vanessa had first responders on the way, I started to ponder what life would be like if I never walked again. I'd been injured before, but not like this.



I wondered how I'd make the most of a life without the ability to walk. Or what if I didn't have use of my legs or arms?



How would I rig up a way to exercise? How could I use my mind alone to contribute to the world and support our family? Could I read and write more? Could I add to my education?



I knew that the faster I accepted that life might forever look different, the faster I’d be able to make the most of that life.



I thought about multiple possible futures and resolved to accept whichever would become reality based on the results of my injury.



As I've learned to do throughout my life, I jumped from the reality of an unwanted situation to acceptance of that situation. As I later found out from Vanessa, she did the same.



Neither of us spent a moment dwelling on what happened and how we'd want it to be different. Each of us, in our own minds, decided we'd make the most of our current reality.



We accepted things as they were.



Accepting Illness



I’d had a lot of practice with that throughout my life, which made acceptance of my circumstances easy the day that I crashed on my bike. I began learning the value of accepting reality as it was as a child.



I got severely sick when I was four years old. I don't remember it, but I had aches throughout my body and was extremely fatigued. I saw doctors in my hometown of Ely, Minnesota, in Duluth, and eventually at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester.



The doctors didn’t immediately know what was wrong with me. They ran tests all over my body, even doing a biopsy of my testicles at one point. Though I was too young to appreciate the importance of my balls fully, I knew enough to get squeamish about that procedure.



After much poking and prodding, the physicians finally figured out what was wrong.



I had leukemia. Acute lymphocytic leukemia, to be precise.



Most of my treatment took place through the Mayo Clinic, though our hometown doctor, Dr. Steve Park, played a crucial role in my treatment and recovery as well. We carried on our relationship with the Mayo Clinic for 15 years.



Doctors cure this type of leukemia easily today, but when I had it, the cure was a new thing.



At four years old, it’s pretty hard to comprehend what cancer means, though the doctors at the Mayo tried to explain it as be