“I am thankful I didn’t suffer a brain injury.”
What a remarkable statement from a North Carolina bride-to-be approaching her first Thanksgiving in a wheelchair.
Earlier this year, a freak accident at Rachelle Friedman’s bachelorette party paralyzed the 25-year-old from Knightdale, N.C., forcing her to postpone her wedding and readjust to life without sensation below her collar bone.
But when Rachelle chatted with Meredith Vieira yesterday on The Today Show, she and her fiancé displayed incredibly positive attitudes.
“I’m doing awesome,” she told Meredith. “There is no use in being down in the dumps and depressed. It’s not going to get you anywhere.”
Her fiancé, Chris Chapman, has stood by her side. “I never once thought about leaving her or the situation,” he said in yesterday’s interview. “It was simply a matter of: ‘We are a couple. We’re going to get through this.’”
This Thanksgiving Rachelle is working toward her two guiding goals – to get married and to become independent – and focusing on the positive. “We all have something to be thankful for,” she told CNN.
What a testament for us all!
What are the hidden blessings in the crosses you carry? What paradigm shift could you make this Thanksgiving?
