The Story of Me
A day at the beach that ended with a life changed forever.
Disclaimer: This posts contains slightly graphic images. They’re both of me, and important to the story. But I wanted to give you all a heads up.
June 29th, 2007. The day my life changed forever.
It was a beautiful Friday afternoon—sunny, warm, not a wisp of wind, and not a single cloud in the sky.
One of those perfect summer days in Minnesota.
My nanny had agreed to take my sister, two friends, and me to the beach. I don’t remember if we begged her or if she offered, but either way, we were hyped. A day of swimming, sandcastles, and general chaos awaited us.
Before we even got there, a great debate arose over the most important issue of the day—who got to sit in the front seat. My friend’s older sister argued that, as the eldest, she had earned the privilege.
"I get to sit in the front because my nanny is driving the car!" I declared, full of seven-year-old confidence.
Pretty sound logic, if you ask me.
She sighed, conceded, and off we went to the beach.
Side note: If you’re not from Minnesota, a “beach” is a patch of sand along one of the state’s 10,000 lakes, usually filled with kids, floaties, and adults trying to pretend they’re relaxing.
We went hard that day.
Splashing. Tossing a football. Climbing onto each other’s shoulders to wage epic wrestling battles. Even my nanny got in on the fun, using her superior adult strength to throw us across the water like human skipping stones.
At one point, I started pushing her,
Come on, throw me further!
She hesitated. But I kept pushing.
And finally—she caved.
She picked me up.
Yeeted me.
And I hit the water hard.
Water shot up my nose. Flooded my ears. A high-pitched ringing filled my head—like striking a tuning fork against a table.
Frustrated and over it, I waded out of the water and plopped onto our towels, attempting to self-soothe with some crackers.
Then, like clockwork, my stomach started aching.
Not a shocker—I was a chronic stomachache child.
"I wanna go hoooome," I groaned dramatically to my nanny.
Luckily for me, everyone else was wiped too. So we packed up, gathered our soggy towels, and headed to the car.
My friend’s sister—again—tried to claim the front seat.
I was not having it. My frustration was bubbling. My nanny, sensing the impending storm, shut it down with a firm:
Everyone, just sit in the seats that you were in when we drove here.
Crisis averted.
The drive home was quiet. Everyone was sun-drenched and exhausted.
In the front seat, I was struggling to stay awake, my head bobbing forward as I half-listened to the conversation happening in the back.
I chimed in when I heard:
I’ve only broken 1 bone in my whole life. - My friend said.
Oh yeah? Well I’ve broken 3. Ha! - His sister retorted.
From my seat of maturity (the front passenger seat), I turned around, smirking.
I haven’t broken a single bone in my life. And I don’t plan to.
I shit you not—those words actually left my mouth.
And in about 15 minutes, the universe would laugh in my face.
I turned back toward the road. Rested my head against the window.
Then—
Something felt wrong.
My head snapped up.
I felt my body lurch left.
The screech of tires filled my ears.
And everything went—
Black.
An Experience With the Divine
What I saw next, has been a mystery to me ever since.
I opened my eyes.
Above me was a warm, golden light.
It glowed, soft and welcoming. Almost like the sun, but not blinding. Not harsh. Just warmth.
I floated up toward it.
To my left—inky darkness.
To my right—inky darkness.
I wasn’t scared. I wasn’t in pain. I felt weightless. Like a feather drifting on a breeze.
I simply was.
As I reached the entrance of this glow, I instinctively looked down to my right.
A blinding, pure white light flooded over me.
The world snapped back into focus.
Brady, can you tell me how many fingers I’m holding up??
The paramedic in the helicopter said.
I was being airlifted to the hospital.
“Four,” I murmured.
Then—
Black again.
The Crash
I had been in a car accident.
As my nanny was merging onto highway 610, she overcorrected, lost control, and dove into the median.
The car quickly turned back around and brought us into oncoming traffic where we were T-boned, almost directly on the passenger side door.
The front door had been ripped off and lay on top of me. When first responders arrived, they found me pinned—hands raised above my head, like I’d instinctively tried to shield myself.
They had to use the Jaws of Life to cut me free.
My most notable injuries as a result:
Three skull fractures
Broken Tibia and Fibula - right leg
Broken collarbone - left
Slipped epiphysis - left hip
A condition where the growth plate (epiphysis) at the top of the femur (thigh bone) slips off the femoral head.
My sister, four at the time and who was sitting directly behind me, suffered a broken collarbone.
My nanny had a variety of injuries to her back and her foot.
My friend and his sister, miraculously, only ended up with a few cuts and bruises.
I was lucky enough to have blacked out. My brain, overwhelmed by the trauma, didn’t record it.
But my sister remembers.
She remembers the losing control.
She remembers the oncoming car.
She remembers the impact.
She remembers everything.
I may have taken the most physical damage.
But she carries the deepest scars.
The Road to Recovery
I don’t remember much of the years following that day.
I have some fleeting memories of my time in 3rd, 4th and 5th grade. But it’s all very blurry until I went off to middle school.
Before the accident, I was the second-fastest kid in my grade. (I still remember taking second in the mile run. I was pissed.)
After?
I was “the wheelchair kid.”
With the extensive damage to my right leg, I was in a cast and wheelchair for 8 weeks. Because I wasn’t walking around, the injury to my hip went unnoticed and it wasn’t until after I started walking again that it was discovered.
By then, the damage was done. Bone death in my femoral head.
Over the next several years, I had 10+ surgeries on my hip.
At 15, I had my hip fully replaced.
And let me tell you—there is no less cool way to exist in high school than walking around with a cane.
Oh, and the irony? Moments before the crash, I had boasted about never breaking a bone.
Ultimate. Jinx.
The damage to my body was significant. By the grace of God, I don’t deal with many repercussions of those injuries today. Apart from some gnarly scars on my hip, face, head and the necessity to get my hip replaced two or three more times in my life, I came out physically unscathed.
I actually consider myself quite lucky to have gone through such an ordeal.
It’s given me a lot more than it’s taken away.
Finding the Good, Despite the Bad
I could write a whole book about the things that this experience taught me.
To sum it up in one sentence:
Going through hard shit is the best fucking way to learn about life.
For years I asked, Why me?
Out of the billions of people in the world, why did I have the be the one in the car that day.
The answer I landed on?
Perspective. Maturity. Wisdom.
It’s given me a perspective that’s done nothing but bring my immense joy.
It’s brought me my faith, my people, my unique outlook on life.
Today, I feel lucky that my worldview was shaped by such a difficult event.
Its moments of hell, brought me a lifetime of appreciation, gratitude, and permanent awareness of the things in life that truly matter.
There’s So Much Good to Find
This is a defining moment in my life. Who I am today, was born in response to it.
If you take one thing from reading today, let it be this:
Life can be incredibly painful, delivering you blows that you never deserved. But we are not the product of the events that happen to us.
We are defined by how we respond to them.
We have control over who we want to be in this life.
Choose to find the good, in spite of the bad.
And you will start to see the oh-so-subtle beauties life brings us every day.
Oh, and please drive safe :)
Thank you all so much for being here. I couldn’t think of a better thing to share with all of you to round out the start of Soul Mana’s journey.
With the utmost love,
Brady
P.S. - I will be traveling next week and won’t be posting. I’m going to take the time to recharge and reflect on the future of this publication to give you all the best possible content I have to offer. Posts will resume on Wednesday 3/7. I will still be active in Notes/our Subscriber chat in the meantime.
Thank you all for being here. You’re such beautiful humans ☀️
This is an incredible story and some great writing my friend. Thanks for sharing, I know how much courage it takes.
I've always wondered what happened. I knew you had a hip replacement, and I think you were on crutches in a St. Vincent baseball team picture... Ben told me you had been in a bad car accident as a kid, but that's all I knew. Thank you for sharing not only your story, but the incredible growth that can come from hard life experiences. Have a great trip with your besties!!