Andrew DeVries (AD)

AD: I had been told I had a broken leg. What I didn’t realize was that the leg was not broken, it was shattered. After a number of surgeries it became apparent that I would not be able to keep the leg, and as everybody was making plans for my life without a leg, a young hospitalist came up to me and said ’Andy, what kind of golf ball do you play?’ As I’m thinking about my life without a leg, and it would be removed mid-thigh, talking about golf balls seemed almost idiotic, but I did respond that the kind of golf ball I play was a Titleist Pro V1. I woke up in the morning and there were flowers around my room and right in the middle of those flowers was a yellow twelve-pack of Titleist Pro V1. That hospitalist, Sarah, had purchased those for me, and Sarah brought me hope. She had helped me stop thinking about how sorry I should feel for myself and she brought a glimmer of hope that there would be something after loss of leg. I woke up in recovery and I had ten toes. There was a little bit of blood flow and they decided not to take the leg. And when I was to be released, Sarah came in that day to wheel me from my room to the ambulance. And she and I had developed a very close doctor-patient relationship and Sarah shared with me that she had lost her father and she asked me to do her a favor. She said, ’I’d like you to walk me down the aisle.’ And I said ’Sarah, you don’t have a boyfriend.’

She said, ’Some day I will.’

I started to think, I’m going to this next hospital knowing that I might not get out of a wheelchair, and she asked me to walk her down the aisle. Now this accident took place seven years ago, in September of 02. And this summer I got an email from her, saying: ’I have a boyfriend. Will you come?’ And I had the privilege of walking, rather that wheel-chairing, walking Sarah down the aisle.