Name: Finishing the NYC Marathon While Paralyzed
Uploaded: 2022-06-14T21:01:20.000Z
Duration: 5 min 57 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

Present continuous

When I'm running, I completely shut my mind off.

When I'm putting all my energy into it, I feel like I'm on the top of the world.

My name is Hannah Gavios and I am a runner.

I've been a runner since high school. I was on the LaGuardia High School track team.

Running is just a way of letting go and just getting my mind off of anything that bothers me.

I was diagnosed with a spinal cord injury.

I have a fracture at T12 and my bones were completely shattered.

My accident happened in September of 2016.

After I graduated, I landed a job in Vietnam teaching English.

I was on my way back to my hotel but got a little bit lost.

I asked for directions and the guy took me up to a dark wooded area and attempted to rape me.

I pushed my attacker away and when he began following me, I picked up speed and that was the last time I ran in over three years.

According to various reports, as I ran away from him, I fell 150 ft off the cliff.

I was in the air for almost a minute long enough to have all these thoughts.

I already committed to the idea that I wasn't going to live.

When I was in Mount Sinai Hospital, I would walk around with my walker with my crutches in Central Park.

I saw runners doing the New York City marathon and I would just pay attention to people's steps and how effortlessly they would take those leaps.

I just remember feeling bitter and jealous that I wasn't able to do those things anymore.

My dream was to one day run the marathon and I felt like after my accident that was completely taken from me.

I thought the most important thing to do at that very moment was focus on all the small steps rather than the bigger picture.

Even though I can't move my ankles and feet, I have some function in my lower body that allows me to walk and do all the things I do today.

Release anything that doesn't serve you. On your next inhale, reach the fingertips off.

In addition to running, I teach yoga and I practice yoga. If I could learn anything from my practice of doing yoga is to keep breathing.

That helped me get through this horrible experience.

And I decided after my yoga teacher training to sign up for Krav Maga lessons and learn self-defense, just in case I'm ever in a similar situation again, I'll know how to protect myself.

I love being faced with new challenges every day because the more challenges I face, the stronger I feel as a person.

Running now is not so different from the way it was before my accident.

I like to call it crunching or going out for a crutch, it's just maybe looks a little bit different.

Because I could still use my legs, I've decided to use my legs in the marathon.

Good luck, good luck, good luck out there today. Have a great run.

I wanted to run in my own way, but I never really thought that it was possible until my sister sent me a photo of a woman named Amanda Sullivan, who is an amputee and she completed various marathons with her crutches.

I thought maybe that's something I can do as well.

26.2 miles is such a long distance for anybody. You really have to have that mental willpower.

In my case, I'm out there for over 11 hours, most people, you know, finish in five hours.

I have to tell myself, "I'm going to get through this. Everything's going to be okay. I might be hurting now, but once I cross that finish line, I'm going to heal. I can do anything."

I want people to know that no matter what adversity that they're facing in their lives, they can just use that to grow as a human being, and maybe that will steer them in a different direction that they wouldn't have normally thought of.

Before my accident, I was a very active person, but I almost feel like my adversity exposed my character even more.

No matter how much you've lost in your life, there's always gains and there's always something that you're going to grab from it.

If you want something so badly, you're going to find a way to still bring it back into your life, no matter what.

Subtitles ListPlay Video

Finishing the NYC Marathon While Paralyzed

meditation

mental

grab

practice