When you woke up one morning, and realized life will never be the same?
How did you respond?
There I was on a Summer Friday afternoon, and I just finished my first week of work and classes...finally just finished getting my apartment all setup, and looking forward to our senior season (damn, those apartments were dingy). It was the beginning of the summer 2005, and in Easton, Pa, it gets hot in a hurry. I was pumped, I finally had a credit-worthy internship to look forward to, was taking an extra class, and was in the best football shape I had ever been in. It's funny when you become a Senior football player...you enjoy a level of confidence only gained through 4-years of blood, sweat and tears...a feeling of conviction, of pride, of determination....and for the guys that were fortunate enough to either stay healthy, or if they were healthy, have the courage to stick it out 4-years, there was a special bond of appreciation that you know you had earned and now share with your fellow comrades. For some reason, I have this vivid memory of the calm this gave me on that summer day. It was peaceful to a degree, and allowed me to be thankful for my first 3 years leading up until that point. I finally felt like I matured, and was ready to be the leader my teammates and fellow classmates expected me to be.
My brother Chris was also getting married in one week. I was so excited! I always looked up to Chris (yes, the same Chris in a lot of my stories), and was so proud of him as a big brother, as I am sure if you have older siblings, you've probably felt the same as they approached their weddings. My brothers and I were all in the wedding, too, and really looking forward to supporting him on his big day...he was the first of us to tie the knot! I headed home that afternoon to be on time for Chris' bachelor party on Saturday. First things first though, have to get my stuff ready for work Tuesday (Monday was Memorial Day), and workouts Tuesday afternoon (yea, a little obsessive, I guess). I always hated coming back from trips and having to sprint and get ready for the next day...this way, I could just come home and relax.
I get to Boston, and of course, the homecoming was as expected...warming. Wake up nice and early Saturday, and we went to the driving range during the day (Chris loved the driving range, even-though we all kind of stunk up the place), and rented a limo for the night. It was a pretty low-key bachelor party, actually. Pretty much just limo and dinner...but being just us brothers, things usually got out of hand quickly, so I think it was for the better.
Come Sunday. Do I go home now, and have a night where I can chill, and just prep for the week, or do I stay, and head home tomorrow, Memorial Day?
Ring, Ring...Brian,"Nelly...it's Marc's birthday, and we're going out...let's go!"
Me, "I'm in!" Looks like I'm heading back Memorial Day after all....
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Life After Near-Death: A Normalcy in Football
By: Bonnie DesimoneThe New York Times
EASTON, Pa. - Lafayette fullback David Nelson walked into his off-campus apartment in early August, two months behind schedule.
The place was exactly as he had left it Memorial Day weekend. Clothes for the first day of his summer internship as a management trainee were neatly laid out on his bed. His gym bag was packed for the start of the off-season workouts he had expected to lead as a team co-captain.
Those plans evaporated early on the morning of May 30, when Nelson nearly died after he was stabbed in the chest when he stepped in to break up a fight between a friend and a stranger in downtown Boston.
Luck, rapid medical attention and diligent rehabilitation had brought Nelson back to where, remarkably, he was cleared to play again. But he had been so focused on recovering that he had not really dwelled on what had happened to him.
Then he opened the door and saw the mundane evidence of how brutally his life had been interrupted.
"I sat down and cried," said Nelson, a sturdy 5-foot-11, 235-pound, 22-year-old senior from Dover, Mass., with a crew cut and clear green eyes. "Then I thought: 'O.K., you got it out. Let's go.' And I put on my shirt and shorts and my gym shoes, and I went to work out.
"Football, for me, marked living my regular life again."
Nelson has started all 10 of Lafayette's games this season. He is the lead blocker on running plays and has 17 catches for 186 yards and 2 touchdowns. The last score, a 13-yard reception last week at Holy Cross in front of his family and friends from the Boston area, helped cement a 41-21 victory and maintained Lafayette's hopes for a Patriot League championship.
Lafayette (7-3), Lehigh (8-2) and Colgate (7-3) are all 4-1 in the conference going into today's regular-season finales. The Leopards can earn their second consecutive automatic bid to the N.C.A.A. Division I-AA tournament if they beat Lehigh on the road and Colgate loses at Georgetown (4-6).
If Lafayette and Colgate win to tie for the conference title, Colgate, which defeated Lafayette, would advance.
Nelson was stabbed during a night out with high school friends. As they walked toward a parking garage near Faneuil Hall, a man in a car yelled insults. Words were exchanged, and the man circled back, jumped out of his car and began to threaten one of Nelson's friends.
When Nelson tried to intercede, a fight broke out. The man stabbed him, got back into his car and fled. No arrest has been made and the case is still open, said Officer John Boyle, a Boston Police Department spokesman.
Nelson's friends tied a shirt around his chest. One applied pressure while others, including Villanova safety Brian Boyson, begged cab drivers at a nearby taxi stand to take them a few short blocks to Massachusetts General Hospital. Two drivers refused, but a third agreed, with Boyson screaming at the cars ahead to clear a path.
The knife had pierced the pericardium membrane and the right ventricle of Nelson's heart. The bleeding rapidly swamped his heart, preventing it from pumping, a condition known as tamponade. Nelson was still breathing, raggedly, but Boyson said he felt Nelson go limp as he helped him out of the back seat.
By the time the unconscious Nelson reached the emergency room, doctors could not get a blood-pressure reading or a pulse. They opened his chest, plugged the hole in his heart, drained the excess blood, and manually resuscitated him.
"He was essentially dead for five minutes," said Dr. Thomas MacGillivray, the surgeon who operated on Nelson. That amount of time without a pulse, MacGillivray said, is "pushing the limit" to where most people sustain some kind of brain damage, as he somberly informed Nelson's parents.
"We had him alive, but we didn't know how much we had him," said Nelson's mother, Nancy.
Nelson regained consciousness later that day. He had lost his short-term memory but had escaped serious brain damage. Drugged, disoriented and stubbornly strong, he tried to tear the tubes and bandages off his body.
Four days later, refusing painkillers, Nelson walked out of the hospital. That weekend, he put on his tuxedo and attended his older brother's wedding in the family's backyard, dancing and allowing himself a sip of Champagne.
Nelson's youth and fitness helped his heart heal quickly, but scar tissue girdled his ribs and made movement difficult. He lost 20 pounds, mostly muscle. In early July, he began swimming laps to break up the binding tissue, then began running sprints up the slope behind the family's house while wearing a harness and pulling weights on a sled.
When he rejoined the team, "it did take a lot of convincing to make people believe I was the same old Dave," he said.
The senior linebacker and co-captain Maurice Bennett said his doubts vanished shortly after contact drills began. "He's a physical player, and when he comes at you, you better hit back," Bennett said.
Lafayette Coach Frank Tavani said Nelson's businesslike attitude in practice helped settle his qualms, but he admitted to an occasional sense of wonder.
"Here's a kid who's had a knife through the heart, was on the other side for however long and came back," Tavani said. "When he spoke to the team in our first meeting about what playing meant to him, and almost having it taken away, the freshmen's eyes were popping out of their heads."
Nelson, an anthropology-sociology major, wants to start a contracting business after he graduates next spring. He said his experience had strengthened his religious faith and changed his concept of toughness.
"It's not kicking someone's butt," he said. "It's setting goals and exceeding them, doing more than what's expected of you."
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I didn't make it home, not that Monday at least, and experienced something that changed me forever, but for the better. Do I forgive the person who do this to me? Without an inkling of a doubt, YES. They don't know it, but they gave me a gift...perspective.
The heart of a champion.
Brian puts it best, but please understand I am sharing this out of my deep belief that all people have the capacity to 'will' themselves to overcome and succeed. I believe it, and I believe in you. Brian did anything he could to save my life that day. Thank you, Bri, I love you buddy.
I will leave you with this recent note Brian sent to his Tough Mudder team (awesome event, by the way. One of the more rewarding races you can put yourself through). Have a good night, and always believe in yourself and what God gave you....no matter what. Believe in big things....I do.
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By Brian Boyson - Teammate
I would like to share a quick personal story with the team. This story is actually about someone who did the last tough mudder with us and someone who I am very close with a friend, a comrade, a brother. His name is David Nelson and I have never in my entire life met anyone as tough, passionate, tenacious, hard working, loyal and courageous as this person. Life is a collection of experiences and it is our reaction to those experiences that shapes our lives. This experience has changed the way I live my life and has enlightened me to the awareness of the significance of living a life based on core values, thankfulness, integrity, passion and genuine character.
Memorial Day Weekend 2005 I reunited a bunch of friends who played football together in high school to get together in Boston. We had a great night and reconnected at the Black Rose. We left and as we approached the parking garage where we had parked all hell broke loose. Some words were exchanged between one of my friends and someone driving a vehicle. A person in an escalade stepped out of his vehicle and went to hit one of my friends. Dave being such a loyal friend stepped in front of my friend to protect him since the guy was double his size. The man stabbed Dave with a knife 3 times. Once in the arm, once in the side of his ribs and once directly through the heart! I was first to approach him thinking just a couple punches had been thrown I quickly realized from all the blood that he had been stabbed then the most horrific moment after just seeing his arm, blood started pouring through his shirt. I then realized he had been stabbed through his heart. I looked up and saw 10 cabs. I begged and pleaded with them to take us to the hospital yelling my friend was dying. First cab drove away, then the second saying they couldn’t take a passenger who was bleeding. Finally in a desperate attempt all 8 of us surrounded the 3rd cab and demanding he take us. He finally did. It was pure chance that we were only two blocks from the best heart hospital in the country Mass General. We did everything we could to keep dave alive including smacking him in the face to keep him conscious. We arrived at the emergency room and I yelled for someone to help it seemed like it took forever. Here I was holding one of my best friends in my arms who had been brutally stabbed and in the heart of all places. Even in this moment Dave fought like hell to for every breathe, to keep his eyes open, clinging to life as he was not going to give up and accept death. Then he went limp in my arms and I knew something terrible had just happened but I didn’t know he had just died. He was immediately taken from me.
Dave had emergency heart surgery. They opened him up patched his wound shocked him, brought him back to life and induced him into a coma. He was dead for over 5 minutes and the possibility of brain damage was very high. 3 days later he came to and thought he was still in a battle for his life. He ripped all the Iv’s out of his body and thought he was still in the fight the nurses had to hold him back and explain that he was in the hospital. He was discharged 2 days later. His older brother was getting married and knowing Dave he wasn’t going to miss it. He left the hospital and with the help of his family was able to attend his brother’s wedding. He also got elected captain that year for Lafayatte which is a Division 1AA competitive football program prior to the stabbing. The doctors told him he couldn’t do a thing for 2 months due to the wound, surgery, and he had staples in his ribs because they broke him open. Dave didn’t accept this. He wasn’t going to let someone take what he loved away from him something he had enjoyed and played all his life, football. He started swimming and started working out in the half the recommended time within 1 month. He showed up to the 3 week long football camp which is tough for someone who is in shape, let alone someone coming back from the dead. He was last in every drill and sprint when he arrived but he didn’t give up. By the end of camp he was leading in everything and leading his team. Dave started every game that season and lead Lafayatte to a league championship and a playoff berth.
This was truly a remarkable come back! The New York Times did a full page article on Dave and his incredible story. You can check it out here. http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/19/sports/ncaafootball/19lafayette.html
There is not a day that goes by in which I do not think about this experience. I try to push myself to appreciate and cherish everyday and every moment. Every time I see Dave or think about him he is truly an inspiration. People too often feel sorry for themselves or point fingers at others or give up when things get tough. Dave could of easily had given up on life, on football and on being the leader of his team due to his circumstances. Dave chose to persevere and embark on a mission that would be probably the most challenging of his life. This is my favorite quote from him in the article and resembles something which has defined Dave his whole life. It's not kicking someone's butt," he said. "It's setting goals and exceeding them, doing more than what's expected of you."
I congratulate all of you for taking a step to conquer this challenge of the Tough Mudder. For setting a goal and sacrificing time, effort, sweat and tears to accomplish it and be triumphant. I hope everyone can take away something from Dave’s story!
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