Ask Me Anything About My Injury | 12 Years Later

my makeshifter thing is kind of it works oh you turned it over yeah but it works okay we're live baby yeah here we are people we're just hanging out and waiting I like that system that's helpful yeah here we are in our um very echoey uh room the most I could leave room in the house room yeah for sure it's perfect though cool I'm gonna turn that a little bit so today it is two days before my anniversary yes 12 years it's pretty wild to think about it is pretty wild I really do feel like every year goes by quicker for some reason really yeah you do a lot maybe that's why we do a lot of traveling a lot of different things going on time flies when you're having fun yeah but I feel like your college Years probably flew by too though yeah maybe every year just flies by I don't know it just it just feels it's hard to wrap my head around 12 years I think yeah I can see that that's a long time it is a long time I'm only four years away from being paralyzed more in my life than being able-bodied is that weird yeah because with how quickly the years feel like they're going by that's going to be like tomorrow the majority of my life will have been spent in a wheelchair yeah yeah I could see that which is Wild audio is super low hmm audio is low I mean we're very but we're very close to the um we're very close to the thingy I'm not sure fix that no no unless they I think people are just gonna have to turn their volume up I think I see a mixer here and I could try to turn it up but it's as loud as it goes Advanced Audio properties where you see that at the bottom oh what um Mike slash ox this one yeah click that and just keep clicking it up can I just go one I don't know if that'll help but all right let's try that hopefully that helped how about two we're we're live experimenting we made the volume louder on our end to see if that helps so okay some people are saying it's fine yeah okay well so for 12 years we uh we thought it would be fun to like actually talk about the injury and and so Charisma is going to do some moderating to me in the comments section looking at all of your questions and stuff yeah and we just want it to be super open and free and ask anything you want and uh and we'll talk about it yes I also wanted to um wanted you to explain quickly though how your injury happened for a lot of new people to the channel because we did get a boost in following we got had a like a lot of people subscribe recently so a quick overview of what happened almost 12 years ago and then everyone can just start submitting their questions and I'll moderate it how in-depth should I go or should I wait for the questions to go in depth you can do your brief like speak ing so I was born May 1st oh my gosh 1995. yeah all right so yeah 16 years old um I went with a few of my friends to the James River it's which flows through the city of Richmond we would go to to the Rapids a lot and it was a common place for people our age to hang out and I grew up in the water so I was really comfortable and even though it was Rapids you know I didn't really think much about it because I was I'm like a little fish you know where I was like a little fish and now I'm like a dead fish in the water and at the time I was very very comfortable and so I didn't really worry my mom worried she was like isn't that where people get injured a lot and where people have died I was like come on come on you know I'm great at swimming it it's going to be fun but I do not account for um was diving in and hitting a rock just below the surface of the water and I know whenever I say that I just imagine people are thinking well why would you do that well of course I wouldn't just dive into the ground I couldn't see the bottom and this was a place where I had dove into the water many times before without any issue but it being Rapids you don't know how things are shifting below the surface rocks could move around whatever the case may be so this dive I my trajectory was a little too low I hit the bottom and instantly I broke my C4 C5 C6 T1 vertebrae and my neck completely blowing up my C5 vertebrae which so is essentially non-existent just immediately um and I felt the impact and it reminded me when I was playing football because I was like a linebacker for a while playing football and I would hit somebody just head to head and you get this like flash of white and you're kind of like Jarred for a second before you like come to again it felt kind of like that although I didn't have a helmet um yeah so in my mind in that moment S I kind of like collected myself I I knew that I still had to cross the river because you know the next set of Rapids were weren't far down down river so in my head I'm I'm stroking my arms I'm kicking my legs as hard as I can to get across the river but nothing was moving no movement at all and obviously that's a very foreign thing to me because super comfortable in water so I opened my eyes and all I could see were like my arms just being jostled about by the Rapids and then from my head was emanating this this cloud of red which was blood obviously um and so I'm still kind of in a State of Shock so like it's slightly registers with me that this is not good um I I know instinctively I just I just need to hold my breath I I can't breathe in this water and there wasn't really anything for me to do but just to hold my breath and after a few seconds or I actually really don't know how long it was I felt my head get pulled up out of the water just my head so I'm still face down my head gets pulled up and I take a deep breath and then I go back underwater and very weird I don't know exactly what's happening but then I feel arms around me like working with my body and I get flipped over and I I realized that my friend had jumped into the water swam out to me grabbed me helped me get a breath first flipped me over so that my back was on his chest so if I'm him he had his arms underneath me and towed me just like that back to the side of the river from where I dove and um I'm very confused I don't really know what's going on I become even more confused when my friend takes his bathing suit off like what the heck are you doing he's screaming for someone to call 9-1-1 he puts his bathing suit against my head and just holds it there and I learned later he's just trying to stop for bleeding he had boxers on so he wasn't naked it was a good thing um so they they did that and one of one of my friends who was there was a track star and because we were at a pretty isolated part of the river he took off and started running back to where civilization was and eventually that's where the ambulance showed up he brought them to where we were and the paramedics came and they started asking me questions like can you feel this no can you feel this no and while they're asking me this I'm just looking up at this guy because I can't move if I'm just laying on the rocks which were super painful on my shoulders the rest of my body was now really tingly for some reason I didn't understand why and and my shoulders just hurt so much from the rocks and they keep asking me can you feel this can you feel this I'm like no no no no no I can't feel it stop asking me the stupid question obviously they were trying to figure out with my neck injury the extent of the damage and quickly learned it was extensive um so they put me on a stretcher stabilize me put me on a raft and towed me across the river so that they could carry me back to the ambulance and then take me to the hospital and I I don't remember a lot of after when after the paramedic showed up um I'm I was told afterwards that I was conscious during that during that like window I just don't remember it I think my brain was shutting things down to try to just protect me it wasn't shot at your body was in shock yeah yeah um so I I in my head I woke up in the hospital I pretty much teleported from the rocks to the hospital which is a very alarming thing to wake up to I just see the fluorescent lights above my head you hear all the machines beeping around me and like the pitter patter of blood just like dripping on the floor um and then they put me in traction because they had to correct my neck before they could like go in and like really really operate so they put this Halo on my head which looks like a torture device and then hung jugs of water to essentially snap my neck back into place um so that could have been a scene in Saul oh my gosh so after they did that I went into surgery um eventually they intubated me which means they put a tube down my throat because I lost the ability to breathe on my own and that was one of the worst parts of the whole experience I hated that tube it was it was awful I just kept asking please take it off please take it out eventually they gave me a trick instead so that I could breathe that way and um and thus began the rehab process which was long and slow and painful not just for me but for everybody that's pretty much the injury that's how that that day went yeah 12 years ago it's weird it was weird it was a very descriptive sorry I might have been long sorry it's fun I mean I feel like you know there's a lot to the story that you can tell that story for an hour if you wanted you know there's a lot of things that happen um for you and it was interesting when you interviewed the firefighter yeah hearing his perspective because he you didn't know you were awake the whole time that was when you found out you were awake the entire time and he told you that side of the story so that was really interesting yeah it was interesting I remember talking to him about moments where he was communicating with me that I don't remember at all yeah and all of a sudden I'm starting to like get these flashes in my head again of like of those moments yeah um it's quite interesting he what stuck with him was when they were loading me to the ambulance I like stopped him for a second I was like hey thanks thank you yeah so I vaguely remember that but even in shock Cole was like trying to thanks guys appreciate you saving me for sure uh do you want me to go with the question start with the questions now yeah okay this one's gone were you worried about your disability affecting relationships before you met charisma oh for sure and I'm assuming romantic relationships when they ask that yeah uh absolutely well friend even just my friendships you know um I was worried about those and sure enough I lost a number of friendships but when it came to like dating yeah I was very worried because I I had lots of um girls that were friends that you know sometimes I would pursue and you know I was dating and interested in girls and all of that and girls were interested in me and that did change after my injury and uh I felt invisible all of a sudden you know um I didn't find that I was having those little moments like in the cafeteria making eye contact with a girl from across the way um yeah I didn't really have that anymore and so dating kind of fell on the Wayside which is really really a bummer and I I think I tried to convince myself that that was fine and then in college like I didn't really make an effort because I you know I was it was cool it's not a big deal but I think deep down it did bother me um which is why towards the end of college I was like you know screw this I'm ready to put myself out there I'm a good dude and I I and it can be a valuable partner and I want that in my life so um in my senior year I went on my first date in college one day come on Cole you can do better than that but it wasn't long after college that I was ready to put myself out there and eventually found Charisma and at that point had a different idea of yeah I know relationship I know that was only a couple months after you graduated too yeah like you graduated in Maine we met in November yeah so it wasn't too long after I was over it someone said um did you have the did you lose the ability to breathe on your own and our lungs controlled past the injury point right so I I did lose the ability to breathe on my own but it took some time there's a misconception about spinal cord injuries that all of the spinal cord damage is done immediately um and to a degree that's true but a lot of the damage like the long-term damage that's done by spinal cord injury happens after the swelling occurs so your body is naturally trying to protect itself and to fix that area but in actuality is doing more damage um so when I was like going to the hospital I still had a limited function of things like I could still like slightly move my arms and stuff and I slowly lost that as my body was trying to heal and that also took away my ability to breathe because C3 C4 C5 keep the lungs alive I damaged a lot of that um so I did lose the ability to breathe this one said um oh I just saw it oh do you think you have PTSD from the from the accident hmm that's interesting I'm not sure I think my brain did a pretty good job protecting me from that because I can barely remember yeah I mean I do get scared in water where I used to never have any fear of water but like when we went tubing together I I felt like I had an irrational fear that if I kept thinking about it I wouldn't have done it I kind of had to like shut that down and I think that that is some like some trauma there but it's not super intense yeah I also think yeah I think you have a good job of like you do a good job of suppressing those that fear of water um I think but maybe at the beginning of your injury was more severe than it is now because you've gotten in the water a lot since then but I would never get in the water without someone around I would be scared I would spasm and flip over and oh for sure and you've done that when I was in the water with you and I struggled flipping you back over because you're you're kind of top heavy and it's just like a really awkward position it was I couldn't touch the bottom so it was very difficult um someone asked did you take anti-depress depressants at the beginning of year or any time during your injury injury and now antidepressants yeah I I was on antidepressants um part of my rehab regimen was meeting with the counselor so regularly I was talking to a therapist about my feelings where I was how I was doing and for a while they put me on antidepressants um but I think I got off of them before they really had an opportunity to take effect because antidepressants don't they it takes like six weeks or something I don't know anything about antidepressants it's like a whole process of first they have to start working and then you have to like hone the dosage and once I was ready to be discharged from rehab I was kind of overall the medicine because I would take so much medicine that I ended up like starting to fall asleep in rehab like in between sets I'm like nodding off and I go when I look at all these pill bottles and every single one of them is like may cause drowsiness may cause drowsiness may cause drowsiness I was like screw all this I don't want all this stuff I don't want to keep pumping my system full of all this and uh and so I stopped taking them sorry I didn't mean it loud someone said put your glasses on girl no I was going to but the light we have a light back here and it's too much of a reflection so I took them off well it might not be because it's above us you think so let's see let's see here let me turn into the other thing so bad okay one okay I still can't see that one though um I saw a good question um oh have your spasms gotten worse or better since your injury uh I think they're pretty much the same I don't I was taking a lot of spasm medication those are some of the medications that were making me so drowsy all the time so I just got off of them and just dealt with my spasms um unfortunate though that my spouses aren't that bad there are some people with horrible spasms and mine just mine are very manageable which is fortunate and they're not uncomfortable for me the only they're just inconvenient they're just annoying like I'll be editing on my computer and all of a sudden my legs are kicking out and my back goes like this and I just have to wait for it to finish and then just get back to work so assassins aren't really bad and they've kind of been consistent yeah which is why you don't have a backlifting pump I saw a question about back of the pump in your spasms I mean you're spazzing right now but your spasms aren't uh and aren't that bad to where you uh uh want them or need them see that that's all it really was just that yeah and it's going to be done here in three two one like a one and a half done this question is good this one says oh my gosh we're gonna go oh as a trauma ICU nurse I've always wanted to know the good and the bad of your interactions with nurses what do they do well and was there room for improvement oh that's very interesting I overall had a very good experience with my nurses um at BCU where I was first taken they did a great job I still am friends with those nurses like especially Jenny like we still talk to Jenny all the time she's awesome we had a very intense nurse who would come in and she would like pound me on the back because at that time I wasn't able to clear out all the flim that kept building up from just like being stationary and my my nervous system reacting the way it was so much phlegm comes up and you gotta get that phlegm out and a lot of times the only way to do that is to roll the patient on their side and smack their back hard and this was really difficult like for my mom to watch because like she would be standing beside the bed and I'm like looking at her like top tone stop it hurts it hurts and my mom would get so mad and tried to get like starting to get mad with the nurse and the nurse pulled my mom aside and was like look I'm saving your son's life right now like this has to be done if this isn't done your son is going to be super sick and unhealthy and so we just had to deal with it and so I'm grateful that those nurses they knew what they were about and they made sure it was done the only bad experience I have is with one nurse at Shepherd and overall my experiences with with nurses at Shepherds was awesome but one nurse this was I still had lots of neck and shoulder pain and she was like dressing me or washing me and being really rough with me and I actually like please like be more gentle like this is really painful and I knew she didn't need to be that hard because other nurses weren't and she said to me oh like hush you'll thank me one day yeah I talked to the nursing staff never had that nurse again and I would not thank her to this day yeah because there was no reason for her to be that rough and then to be that Sasser so yeah crazy baby I'd love to meet you guys one day who is that that's so funny what up Curtis hi Cruz okay there there's this uh this do you want to answer this question no insult intended oh here you date black women before your injury injury it's so interesting that people ask that because I think people forget how young Cole was he just turned 16. yeah he just turned 16. and so I don't know by y'all but I mean I didn't date a ton of people at 15 years old or earlier than that like that's when you're starting to figure that stuff out yeah my first real boyfriend I was like 17 and so I think it's just such a strange question because you were so young but anyway you can go and answer that no the answer is no Charisma is the first black woman I dated and I don't know how I managed it but uh the first black woman I dated happened to be the best one in the world it's incredible how I how I found that no I think it's just it's just like also young so even if his like we just we can't predict that it's such a what if in hypothetical situation um and I think everyone's preference or who they date changes because when I was in high school I mean I didn't date any a single white guy until the year I met Cole was the first time I seriously dated a white guy and so I mean I dated black guys all throughout high school so I think it's just it's just interesting you know life just takes you in a different direction I had interest in black girls before Charisma yeah sure yeah yeah um um how long was your rehab First Rehab session was from August 21st I think I got to Shepard and then I got I I was discharged and got home like December 21st or something so about six months is that right no no that's not right I thought it was like 120 some days yeah like 120 some days yeah and then I continued rehab at home and then I went back to Shepard for another like couple months yeah and then I continued it when I came back home again which is how we met yep so rehab never really stopped um until we moved here yeah until we moved here uh and then we I do my stuff uh this one this one says do you walk in your dreams yeah it's interesting I think I used to walk more in my dreams um I still do Walk In My Dreams today but more often than not I'm like limping or like I have to use a walker or I'm in slow motion or like I'm doing the things I used to love when I was able-bodied like playing LaCrosse or basketball but I for the life of me can't make a shot or like I just can't throw the lacrosse ball like it's weird it's weird it's like my brain is trying to be able-bodied like it used to be but it also knows that I'm not anymore and I can't like you know mesh that yeah I find that quite interesting actually I feel like that could be an interesting video um this one's from mental health therapists what made you emotionally strong or what made you yeah emotionally strong after the incident mentally strong after the incident frankly this may sound like a very Like Pat myself on the back answer but I think I was mentally strong before and I think I I was very open-minded in my therapy so that like I was willing to try the things that my therapist was advising me to try um which is processing my grief talking about it working through it like I've really really dove in head first into therapy um because I wanted to get the most out of my rehab also I think my parents instilled in me like you can you can be mad you can be pissed off about your situation but like you gotta you gotta get happy in the same what is the saying my mom uses um you can get hat the same pants you got the same pants to get glad and that you got mad in something like that I don't know she doesn't remind us yeah but basically like it's a choice um that you can make every day waking up yeah happy or upset about your situation I think acceptance was the biggest part of it like I had to just accept my situation and understand that I can't just change this so I gotta figure out how to live like this yeah and uh and it didn't happen overnight it took a long time it was a lot of grief it was a lot of sadness and then I would have a week where I was fine and then a day where I'll just break down and then another week I was fine and a day I'd break down yeah I remember Cole telling me right before we had met you were in a pretty rough Place mentally yeah well I would still have I think I have seasonal depression and so a lot of times when winter would roll around I would find that I would be getting irritated with my limitations my disability um and it would kind of just like ruin me and grow in me until like I would just like break down again um which is one of the reasons I love La is I don't feel that seasonal impression here yeah there's a lot of sunshine a lot of vitamin D yeah it's helpful it really is this one I've seen this question on especially in the last video but it's like have you ever thought about getting an ostomy bag or ever thought about getting um what's the one for bladder Yeah so basically an awesome new bag is where you you just don't have to avoid you void your bowels into an awesome bag or the super pubic is where you your bladder output goes into um super pubic so they're all on the outside of your body and it's much more manageable for a lot of people with spinal cord injuries which is why they get it coal does not have either right I have neither I did years ago look into getting a suprapubic catheter or super pubic just a super pubic yeah yeah and because I know a lot of quads that have them and love them and for those who don't know super pubic is basically like they they rewire some stuff in your belly so that there's a hole here that you can access your bladder through rather than going into your pants and it makes life a lot easier for people who have difficulty getting into their pants and and doing that it makes it easier for you to avoid too A lot of people they can avoid much easier when they have that it allows them to be more independent right Independence is a huge part of it yeah and this was before I realized I could do my own ICS that we were considering this never went through with it and just learned how to do my ICS so I was happy with that we were good with that yeah but the ostomy bag is something that we still think about because my bowel program is like the biggest part of like caregiving for me and the biggest thing that I just cannot do on my own and cannot figure out honestly we tried that's just probably not in the cards for me yeah um so especially like with children that may be on the table at this point we're not there yet but we're that's in that's in the cards yeah yeah I think in the future it's going to be easier because Cole will be able honestly probably to be by yourself if you had an ostomy bag I think you may be able to oh that's tricky that's tricky I don't know yeah I'm not super familiar with how it works honestly no but it would allow you to be in uh more independent so there's so many questions um oh man I feel like every time like people type it moves the the chat so I lose questions yeah I have to like swipe back up um before you oh here's before your accident were you emotional and did you cry easily before your accident no I don't think so not really I feel like I've become way more emotional and I've talked to quads about that crazy baby if you're still in here I remember we had a conversation um how we feel like we've become more emotional after the injury I think I think when you hit your head that hard you know I think I don't know I just feel like you appreciate you see life differently after an injury too um you say like you tell everyone you love them like you're so in touch with like your emotions and telling people how you feel every day you make sure everyone knows that they're loved and so I feel like maybe you were like that before I don't know but I feel like it's become stronger after your injury something that always gets me or any sort of portrayals of supporting someone or lifting someone up like if something like that happens in a movie where something's going wrong like she always has Gray's Gray's Anatomy on yeah they're like saving someone's life and when I watch that I always get emotional because I've been the recipient of all that love and giving and care and compassion and and that always gets to me yeah that makes sense I love dishes it's my comfort show us oh man what was that I keep uh someone's asking me if you deal with pain I've seen that a couple times oh anything to help dealing with pain and if you personally deal with pain too um I don't I don't deal with much pain I'm I'm very fortunate with that so I can't really speak on pain yeah and do you have any fears after your injury oh fears I think my biggest fear is someone taking advantage of me um because I can't like defend myself yeah that is a big fear I think that's something we both think about my my biggest fear may be like being on a walk with Sophie and someone just like takes her yeah that scares the poop out of me well hopefully she won't let them yeah hopefully she will go vicious yeah I don't know something because like she just is such a kind dog to people that I hope she would recognize if someone's not good and like but she also does pick up like energy yeah if something weird is going on like one time we were walking down the hallway in our old apartment complex and a guy who we knew and we were cool with he like stood in the doorway like blocking the path and we were far away and so if he was immediately on alert and I think you should grow out and bark like don't do that like who are you yeah and he was like all right maybe I shouldn't like mess around yeah like that's the first time she's done that or the second time she did growl at a man one time randomly he didn't even say anything to her but she just didn't like his energy and growled at him like and she's like she never does that so maybe she would what about this one how would you describe your spirituality through your circumstances and relationship and thank you Bert Bernita yeah this is a oh man I I thought I feel that I'm a very spiritual person and I grew up in the church and when I was younger I mean I was like the religious friend we both were actually yeah I was called the Jesus streak in high school yeah and so after my injury I've been on quite a journey with that um definitely come and gone from Faith um I I feel that I've always been steady with my spirituality but faith is just hard I don't know it's a there's a lot to reconcile being disabled with the religion where people tell you oh God would never give you something that you can't handle which God never said that's not really in the Bible yeah um but I think it's a it's a belief that people had it's like you know you wouldn't be given a challenge that you can't handle so it almost makes you feel like if you're not handling it then something's wrong with you yeah almost you know yeah and then also like you know God was a a plan for you um that's a tough one to hear because you know lots of people get paralyzed and don't make it the person whose room I took at the shepherd center literally died a few months later and so it's hard to reconcile like all right if God has a plan for me what was his plan for Batman yeah um it's just a lot to recommend I think when you go through a spinal cord injury you really and I think a lot of people's fine foot injuries have this moment where they just like everything kind of gets confusing um when it comes to to that topic um I just feel like it's it's it can become confusing especially when it's you see the constant um if you pray harder enough you would be healed and you spent all like so much praying in the beginning of your relationship praying to be healed praying to walk again and that's really challenging I think um so I I think that makes it makes it tough too yeah because there's also nothing wrong with being disabled and if you never walk again it doesn't mean that you didn't have strong enough faith and you didn't pray hard enough and that's why you're still paralyzed has nothing to do with that right it's just it's it's what it is it's really hard to hear like yeah we're gonna pray for you to heal to be healed yeah well I've been healed like I'm I'm healthy right now you are and I'm okay um so I don't know that's a really tough one I'm I'm still I'm still in there yeah um wow there got there was a lot of questions um do you worry about freaking UTIs caused by Kathy and their correlation to bladder cancer that's actually a really really good topic because we did some research about the correlation between um UTIs and bladder cancer and caffeine and all that stuff and if you have an increased risk for bladder cancer because you self-cat app and it's quite an interesting thing let's go ahead yeah I you know I would be more worried about UTIs if I felt like I was getting UTIs but I I've been cathing a lot and my bladder seems to be pretty healthy yeah I do like keep a close eye on if I'm seeing sediment in my um and when I do I'm I know I'm like oh gotta start drinking right now and then I just pound water and then I'm clear and I'm good to go so but you also take cranberry I take cranberry every day yeah so you do things to try to keep your bladder healthy constant drinking water not drinking too much like sugary stuff um taking cranberry supplements um oh man oh man I had one that was good uh do you see any good ones oh someone asked you've talked about this plenty of times would you rather have your hands back or be able to walk again oh I'll take my hands well I mean well so what's the context there because like if if I can walk again means ability back and yeah I mean I would choose being able-bodied but if I could walk but I still have to deal with everything and I don't have my hands and I don't have bladder about sexual function all of that stuff I'm gonna take my hands all day long my life would be completely changed if I had my hands yeah I do everything I would be completely independent yeah you could do anything yeah um how has it been trying to get metal equipment I've been denied for a standing wheelchair because they said it would not be an improvement of my life yeah medical equipment sucks yeah yeah what's very frustrating we learned is insurance will cover what you will fight for a lot of times they'll just deny automatically and then you have to appeal it and then they like automatically deny that too and then you have to reappeal and the harder you fight all of a sudden they'll start covering things but a lot of people don't know how to fight like that which which sucks or don't have the time and the energy it takes so much effort to go you know going into fighting for for those fortunately my mom was an animal the insurance companies hated my mom because she she was not messing around and she would hound and Hound and Hound until things would be covered um but yeah medical equipment is always a nightmare to get keep fighting that's the biggest advice you just gotta keep fighting keep calling them just don't give up because they'll eventually approve it but you just have to give it time and a lot of energy um do you want to answer one more question yeah do you see any good ones I'm I'm talking I know I'm sorry I'm sorry um I saw something oh someone do you have any friends that have the same uh disability oh yeah for sure well I mean every every spot to put injury is different so we're all slightly different but yeah we uh we definitely have lots of friends yeah we post with a good amount of friends like we were just hanging out with our friends Anthony McKenna Anthony is C5 uh quad um and oh thank you Angel nice thank you um so we hang out with people a lot here ah there was a good one oh have you ever thought about uh tricep um what is it called nerve transfer yes three triceps yeah we have the video on that I know it's so long ago which is why it's an older video but I was looking into getting a surgery done to transfer nerves and unfortunately the nerves that they would need to use to get to my triceps or the nerves that activate my triceps are just dead so that basically told us that even if everything was healed for me the nerves extending from that injury site are so atrophied and gone that they'll never really come back yeah so uh one day I may be able-bodied with no tricep folks yeah which would be weird because triceps like do a lot like we were talking about when Cole fell over in that last video even if Sophie came up and was beside him so we can push off it's still hard to push when you don't have triceps uh it's really difficult yeah you can't push without triceps honestly unless you do it a certain way um so that's why it would be hard to train her to do that um but triceps make a big difference all right I think that's a good one I mean we did a lot you think it's right to start a conversation with someone with a disability by asking about their accident oh that's a good question yeah um my gut says not really I I think if you're trying to get to know someone with a disability you should just ask who they are first get to know them and I think it's more appropriate once you've had like a good conversation and are familiarized with each other before you have something like that what I really appreciate from people I'll just share that what I really appreciate is when I can meet someone and we can just chat and have a conversation and at some point I may like mention something about my disability or injury which means I'm opening that door and then they ask you a question about it but they respectfully wait for me to open that door before they just like dive in yeah I like that yeah I think people are starting to learn that um how to best approach people with disabilities without asking about their injury right away someone did ask this question which I think is a very common misunderstanding Charisma did you worry about losing your job for getting into a relationship with a client Cole was never mine patient never my client we never work together um so no that was never never an issue because we were he was the outpatient literally used the hospital as a gem because it was a hospital I had the equipment he needed so it was in cannabis yeah so it was a gym for him and then I worked inpatient I worked with actual patients who just had a stroke hip replacement different things so it was very very very disconnected we just saw each other because it was the same Hospital yeah no no laws were broken no like our CEO knew that we were dating they're like oh we love you guys so everybody was so supportive yeah yeah no I've never used steroids we'd love to go to Europe one day never been to Jamaica but we'd love to go to Jamaica are you just going through it all rapid firing um I am open to using robotic assisted devices I think the technology is a little late for like the brain machine interfaces or a little early I mean I'd like to see it develop some more before I like do anything with my brain or the head or skull yes if you are injured you would be a what if you are injured right now if you didn't have your injury what career path would you be taking oh I was going down the pharmacy Route I'm interested in like drugs and stuff and yeah and helping people with drugs and I'm just interested in like the chemistry of it yeah so that's where I was going what does your service dog do for you oh her biggest thing is picking things up I'm always dropping stuff and she's gotten so good I don't even have to like tell her anymore she just like hears something drop and runs into the room where is it where is it yeah and then jumps in my lap yeah she just basically that's the one that's the main thing that we really needed Sophie for was picking things up for Cole um and she literally picks so many things up every single day freshman um she hears us talking about him she's right here Sophie do you want to say hi oh she was she was sleeping oh we'll come up here oh Big Stretch it's a big stretch she just got a haircut so she's off cute and groomed yes can you say hi hi everyone there she is she always just lays like right next to Cole were you dreaming of picking things up off the ground what is something you would tell your 16 year old self um after my injury before after injury right now after you're injured what would you tell your 16 year old self after getting hurt it's gonna be okay yeah that's a good one um could you not pursue Pharmacy studies now um sorry I was just saying what was the question sorry I didn't let you say in that movie longer I didn't know you're getting emotional I'm sorry I think it's Sophie she brings me such a calming energy what was the next question um why not do pharmacy now oh because it's so Hands-On um like I I was in lots of uh chemistry classes General chemistry organic chemistry one and two like all these science classes that I would have had to do so many more of all required Labs which were very Hands-On and I figured I'm it dawned on me I'm not gonna be able to work in a pharmacy and be able to like fill bottles and like that's just not gonna happen so um I found an industry that made more sense for me yeah it makes a lot more sense all right I think these are good questions yeah you answered a lot I think so that was a lot I appreciate you all hanging out and all of your questions that was big I don't know if they heard that but she just made up so much noise right now thank you for tuning in and answering uh or asking a bunch of questions so that Cole can answer um this plan for Friday is to just relax because Cole's anniversary is Friday so just relax go to dinner go to the movies yes we were supposed to be home um and so Cole was actually going to be hanging out with the guy who saved him from the river uh this weekend but we decided not to go home because we're kind of exhausted with traveling and stuff so we stayed here yep time to take a break yeah we're just we're just chilling for a while yes yes oh my gosh this question do you want kids of your your own or do you want to adopt both we want both whatever happens happens but we're open to to both obviously we want biological children but we're extremely open to adoption and I've seen that comment and people were like why not just adopt um we never once said adoption was off the table ever and when I Cole and I started dating I told him I I've always wanted to adopt um a child so that was never off the table with us regardless of our ability to have children naturally or not yes yes you want a family there cheers um cool all right well thank you oh my gosh Jess thank you thank you so much what does that mean celebrate the first Super Chat can you click that does something exciting happen I don't know oh no no it's just I think it's just her first Super Chat so like celebrate Christmas I thought it was really like throw up and Betty or something yes yes awesome thanks again I hope you enjoyed uh all the question answerings yes we have a very big video coming out on Sunday talking about an interaction that happened last week that was not good um you won't believe it you won't believe what happened we didn't believe it was happening as it was happening no so check out Sunday's video to just it's a conversation about ableism which I think is a very important conversation to have so check out that video coming on Sunday thank you Jackie thank you Jackie all right y'all we're gonna go take a nap or something thanks no we have our neighbors are coming over to finally see our house so we're showing our neighbors our house for the first time yeah um so we have to actually get ready for that lots of pressure yeah all right thanks for watching bye [Music] see ya you say bye Sophie

Channel: Roll with Cole & Charisma

Views: 77,370

Keywords: cole and charisma, interabled, interracial, roll with cole and charisma, disabled, wheelchair, quadriplegic, married, roll with cole, cole sydnor, cole and charisma youtube, cole and charisma latest video

Id: TbbusJ1DSHE

Length: 47min 50sec (2870 seconds)

Published: Wed Aug 09 2023