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TwitThisIf You're Not Dead, You Can Get Better
Randy Kraus was paralyzed. His left side was useless. But his right hand was good enough to lift the barrel of a .38 to his temple.Once, he'd been a police officer in Fresno, California, and owned a private-eye agency. Once, he'd been strong and able. Now, he felt he was nothing.
His trouble started with Parkinson's disease, but it didn't end there. In July 2002, the 60-year-old Kraus went into the hospital for an operation that implanted electrodes in his brain to control the shaking. But during the operation, he had a stroke. He was paralyzed. The cop, the tough guy, the man who loved golf, "could think, but couldn't move."
Transferred to a rehab hospital, Kraus wanted the therapists to give it to him straight. "You may never walk again," they told him. "Maybe you won't even be able to talk."
Once home, he found he couldn't lift a fork or take a drink by himself. Physical therapy was so painful and slow. What did he have to live for?
So now Kraus held the gun against his head. Feeling the cold metal on his skin, he began to consider not his pain, but the pain he would cause his wife, daughters and grandchildren. He didn't pull the trigger.
And his exercise physiologist, Andrew Garud, didn't pull any punches with him. You are where you are, he told him. The pace would be slow; the pain would be real. "But as long as you are alive, you have the ability to get better."
After three months of working with Garud, Kraus wanted to see if he could stand.
He could. Then he took three steps, sat down and cried like a baby.
One step, as they say, led to another. Next he managed a short walk along the edge of a boxing ring in the health club where they worked out. It was the hardest fight of Kraus's life.
People at the gym cheered him on. Garud kept saying he could do more. Now, Kraus can brush his teeth and shave himself, get around the house with a walker. Little triumphs only the paralyzed can fully understand.
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