His Life: What’s New?
What’s Next?
Jeff returned to East Greenwich
High School just before the second semester started in January, 1999 --
about six months after his devastating spinal cord injury. He became a
member of the National Honor Society, and scored a combined 1520 on the
SAT I exams. Not bad for a paralyzed kid who had to do all the math in his
head, and couldn’t doodle or scratch an ear to ease the tension. He
graduated in June, 2000.
Because specialized housing,
travel restrictions and the need for personal care are major issues in his
life, Jeff decided to stay close to home for college; so he is attending
the University of Rhode Island, as did his
parents more than 30 years before.
Much of what Jeff does is hard.
It takes a nurse or his parents about three hours to get him up and ready
for school in the morning. Making a phone call or sending an email message
is an investment of time and rapt attention for Jeffrey; but he is eager
to make the effort and the rewards of communication are worth their cost.
The process of returning
independence and capacity to Jeff’s life has been slow, because it takes
time to find and then install the right systems. Much of what he needs has
to be custom-made, often in the basement workshop.
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People Magazine
Photo by Michael Carroll |
Jeff faithfully watches The
Simpsons; The Daily Show; and The NewsHour With Jim Lehrer on
PBS. He surfs the net constantly. He listens to gigabytes of music files.
And he scrupulously studies the “special features” on DVDs to learn how
movies are made. In July, 1998, he didn’t know if he would ever be able to
eat solid food again. Now, he eats six times more popcorn than he did
before the accident. And less salad.
 Publication
of Rescuing Jeffrey
has given Jeff opportunities to travel, meet and mingle.
In October, 2000, Jeff and his
father were guests of New Mobility Magazine
at the first Abilities Expo to be held in Boston.
Jeff has been interviewed several
times on radio and local television, and in August, 2000 was a guest on
the MSNBC Homepage show, that was also
broadcast nationally on the NBC network. Additional personal appearances
were in Washington, DC and in Charlottesville, Virginia.
 People
Magazine ran a feature story in June, 2000 -- timed to coincide
with Rescuing Jeffrey’s publication --
and a follow up story appeared in People the following December.
“Road trips” are difficult. Much of Jeff’s medical support system has to
travel with him: his mattress, ventilator equipment, medications,
supplies...and someone to help. A hospital bed and hoist have to be rented
for use in the hotel room.
Jeff’s exposure -- because of
Rescuing Jeffrey -- has earned him a steady flow of email, which he
encourages, and with which he tries to keep up.
He was happy to make the
transition from high
school to college, and enjoys the challenge of a larger, more diverse
student body.
Jeff was just starting to get
interested in photography before his accident, and one of our long term
projects is to adapt a digital camera for his wheelchair, using the laptop
computer as the viewfinder and image storage device.
We may never stop looking for
machines and software and new ways of doing things, and maybe our family
will always be too busy to guess what the future has in store for Jeff.
The accident that set us on our current path was over a fraction of a
second after it began. But it is, in fact, over... and the future demands
all of the attention we can give it. What’s new? What’s next? Who knows?
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People Magazine Photo by Michael Carrol |
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