Always Progressing

In 2023, Chris Thompson had recently married his wife, Hannah, and he was building a career in the audiovisual installation industry in Memphis, Tennessee. He had a well-paying job and felt he was in a good place in life. But in April of that year, a massive LED wall that Chris and his co-workers had just finished assembling fell, pinning Chris beneath it. The screen broke into sections. While his co-workers were able to remove the pieces from on top of Chris, he sustained nerve damage in his right leg, and his left femur was broken, along with 15 ribs and his L-2 vertebra.  

An ambulance transported Chris to Regional One Health in Memphis, where he spent two days in the trauma ICU and had a six-hour surgery during which doctors placed a rod to repair his left femur and fused the vertebrae above and below his L-2 vertebra. Chris could move his left leg, but the nerves in his right leg were severely damaged, so he had very little feeling in his right leg. “I could barely wiggle my big toe,” he recalls.

Chris was told not to get his hopes up about walking — that with a lot of work, he might be able to take a couple of steps at home. “That was some tough news,” Chris recalls.

As Chris and his family weighed rehabilitation options, Hannah’s aunt, a nurse at a nearby hospital, insisted that Chris should go to Shepherd Center. But Chris was wary at first.

“In my knee-jerk reaction to hearing about Shepherd Center and knowing nothing about it, I was like, ‘They're trying to ship me off to some home.’” he remembers.

“And so, at first, I was very against it. And then when I actually looked [Shepherd] up and saw, I was like, ‘OK, I could handle that.’ And I saw that Hannah would be able to come down and be there with me — that really helped ease my anxiety about it.”

Chris transferred to Shepherd Center in May, completing three weeks of therapy in the inpatient Spinal Cord Injury Rehabilitation Program and five weeks in the Day Program. Hannah and Chris’s mom took turns staying in family housing to be with him, and he says family support throughout his rehabilitation made a big difference.

“Hannah, my wife, throughout all of it, just kept pushing me, you know, with the mindset of, ‘I don't care if you can't walk again, but we're gonna do everything that we can to make sure that you've tried.’ And I was like, ‘I agree with that. I'll go for it.’ And so, she really helped encourage me every day to try harder, to try to do a little better.” Chris explains.

While he says that much of his time at Shepherd is a blur, some experiences stand out.

“I remember that I got to swim in the pool a couple of times, and that was really nice because I was actually able to move my right leg a little more than I thought I could at first. And it was one of those things where I was so scared about seeing progress that I wouldn't even tell Hannah. And then I would all of a sudden just show her the progress, and she'd be like, ‘What are you doing?’”

Chris says some of his fears were that he would hurt himself or lose some of the gains he had made, but as his confidence grew, he really “put it into gear and went all out.”

Chris didn’t only swim in Shepherd’s pool — he visited the Georgia Aquarium and swam with the whale sharks for recreation therapy.

“Now, all of a sudden, my whole family is realizing how cool whale sharks are. And I'm like, ‘Yeah, I swam with those guys. Don't forget.’”

He also remembers his occupational therapist, Atom Young, incorporating changing a tire into a therapy session.

“I love my car. And that was one of my big things, I was like, ‘I want to be able to do this.’ So, he helped me do that, and then he helped me do a couple of work things,” Chris recalls.

“Most of the work I was doing [before the injury] was lifting heavy stuff or going on a ladder. So, I couldn't [do that], but Atom was able to give me the stuff that I could do still — so, working with my hands making cables and stuff. I really enjoyed that. Getting to do my work again was nice for a little bit.”

Overall, Chris remembers feeling comfortable in therapy at Shepherd.

“I only have good memories at Shepherd Center, and they're always of the staff members being super nice and just super cool. … It impacted me a lot.”

At the end of June 2023, Chris was discharged from Shepherd. He continued physical therapy for eight months closer to home. Now, he can walk unassisted. He returned to work, but because he still can’t lift heavy equipment or climb on ladders, he began to look for a desk job in the audiovisual industry. He recently found one with a well-established audiovisual company in Memphis. He’s enjoying his new role, soaking up everything he can, and he says his co-workers are very supportive.

He and Hannah live in a town outside Memphis with their two dogs. “That’s pretty much where I like to be,” Chris says. “My favorite space is with them.” 

His advice for anyone beginning rehabilitation?

“Set an unrealistic goal,” Chris laughs. “That's what I did. My unrealistic goal being I'm never gonna stop… I just kept moving forward. Also, looking back and looking at the progress you have made. Don't sell it short just because you can't do something now. Look at what you’ve done that you said you couldn't do at first.

“My mindset is not to be stagnant. In work, in relationships, I always want to be progressing.”

 Written by Ruth Underwood