The Diveheart Family is praying for you brother. Here is a letter from Shane Yost Military Veteran & Diveheart Adaptive Instructor who was just featured in Sport Diver Magazine:
"Sorry for keeping everyone in the dark, naturally I would have kept this whole situation to myself if this didn't get out before hand but since it is out, here's the update:
A few days ago they did my surgery and things didn't go as well as hoped, I lost feeling and motor function from waist down. The biopsy came back negative for malignancies and ended up a rare fungal infection that spread from my lungs to my spinal cord. This infection is usually the symptom of an auto immune disease such as HIV and they were expecting just that. As someone who's never really slept around and been very cautious, this floored me. The last few days they've been running tests for everything and preparing for the worst but my results came back, negative.
That's the first time I've ever cried from getting good news for myself, I don't want to die like this. They call me a 1% case for the medical journals and they've never seen anything like this. It's been difficult to think about how my life will change. Few months ago I had an upper respiratory infection, followed by what I thought was a sprained ankle, then sciatica pain/burning. Numbness kicked in and I lost use of my right foot, then both legs went numb. When I walked in to the ER I was convinced I had herniated a disc and up until yesterday, I thought I might be dying.
I thought about my little boy growing up without me and never seeing him become the man he's meant to be. I thought about not being able to live up to the silent promises I've made all my brothers to make a positive impact on the world and others. I thought about how I was at a point in life where I could see a glimmer of hope for true happiness only to have that cruelly ripped away.
I have a new lease on life, it's not going to be an easy path but an easy life has never been that interesting. I'm aggressively working with physical therapy and occupational therapy and I'm determined to beat this.
I have a long road to recovery, months, even years and my diving days may be numbered for now but at least I know I've got some extra time, I'm not going to waste it, nor should you. Life is a fleeting moment, choose happiness, not obligation."
"Sorry for keeping everyone in the dark, naturally I would have kept this whole situation to myself if this didn't get out before hand but since it is out, here's the update:
A few days ago they did my surgery and things didn't go as well as hoped, I lost feeling and motor function from waist down. The biopsy came back negative for malignancies and ended up a rare fungal infection that spread from my lungs to my spinal cord. This infection is usually the symptom of an auto immune disease such as HIV and they were expecting just that. As someone who's never really slept around and been very cautious, this floored me. The last few days they've been running tests for everything and preparing for the worst but my results came back, negative.
That's the first time I've ever cried from getting good news for myself, I don't want to die like this. They call me a 1% case for the medical journals and they've never seen anything like this. It's been difficult to think about how my life will change. Few months ago I had an upper respiratory infection, followed by what I thought was a sprained ankle, then sciatica pain/burning. Numbness kicked in and I lost use of my right foot, then both legs went numb. When I walked in to the ER I was convinced I had herniated a disc and up until yesterday, I thought I might be dying.
I thought about my little boy growing up without me and never seeing him become the man he's meant to be. I thought about not being able to live up to the silent promises I've made all my brothers to make a positive impact on the world and others. I thought about how I was at a point in life where I could see a glimmer of hope for true happiness only to have that cruelly ripped away.
I have a new lease on life, it's not going to be an easy path but an easy life has never been that interesting. I'm aggressively working with physical therapy and occupational therapy and I'm determined to beat this.
I have a long road to recovery, months, even years and my diving days may be numbered for now but at least I know I've got some extra time, I'm not going to waste it, nor should you. Life is a fleeting moment, choose happiness, not obligation."
