I am a 43 year old woman who suffered my injury during the birthing process. I’ve never known what it is like to have two arms, exercise or play sports. Over the years, I occasionally would wish I could run or rein my horses with two hands. I tried to wear an old shoulder sling that we had around the house, and secretly go down a dirt road to find a place to run where no one would ever see my arm flailing about. But it hurt my neck and back and jarred my shoulder. In the end, I’d just take a deep breath and think: “That was that. There’s no use crying over spilled milk.”
This past fall, on a complete whim one afternoon while avoiding work at my desk, I ran across this site and read about people with my injury who were . . . running?! I was a bit skeptical but I asked for a sling for Christmas (2012) and have been running!! I LOVE IT! For the first time in my life, I can pump my arms (mostly
) when running and not worry about injuring my arm or wrist. It’s only been 5 weeks, but there’s a part of me that is alive now that wasn’t before. I’m experiencing the joy of exercise and benefits of running for the first time in 43 years! I don’t think of myself as handicapped, so a few times I’ve caught myself thinking, “why, oh why didn’t I take up running before now?” and then I remember, “The sling. I could never do this before I had the sling.” Which brings me to my second reason for writing, which is a sincere “thank you” to Dan for pushing forward to design it and let others know about it, and caring enough to follow up. To date, Dan is the first and only person with a brachial plexus injury I’ve ever known, emailed or spoken with. So to Dan I say “You are special person. Thank you for what you’re doing, and I WILL let you know when I run my first 5K!”
