Mud Sweat & Tears - Bear Grylls [75]
Whenever I got out of bed I had to wear a big metal brace that was strapped around me.
I felt like an invalid. I was an invalid. This was crazy.
I’m screwed.
You stupid, stupid idiot, Bear. You could have landed that canopy if you hadn’t panicked, or you should have cut it away and pulled that reserve early.
As it was, I had done the worst of both worlds: I had neither gone for the reserve straight away, nor had I managed to land the canopy with any degree of skill.
I felt I could have avoided this accident if I had been smarter, faster, clearer-headed. I had messed up, and I knew it.
I vowed that I would never fall short in those areas again.
I would learn from this, and go on to become the fastest, clearest-thinking dude on the planet.
But for now, the tears kept coming.
I woke in bed, sweating and breathing heavily. It was the third time I’d had this nightmare: reliving that horrible feeling of falling, out of control, towards the ground.
I was now on month two of just lying there prone, supposedly recovering. But I wasn’t getting any better.
In fact, if anything, my back felt worse.
I couldn’t move, and was getting angrier and angrier inside. Angry at myself; angry at everything.
I was angry because I was shit-scared.
My plans, my dreams for the future hung in shreds. Nothing was certain any more. I didn’t know if I’d be able to stay with the SAS. I didn’t even know if I’d recover at all.
Lying unable to move, sweating with frustration, my way of escaping was in my mind.
I still had so much that I dreamt of doing.
I looked around my bedroom, and the old picture I had of Mount Everest seemed to peer down.
Dad’s and my crazy dream.
It had become what so many dreams become – just that – nothing more, nothing less.
Covered in dust. Never a reality.
And Everest felt further beyond the realms of possibility than ever.
Weeks later, and still in my brace, I struggled over to the picture and took it down.
People often say to me that I must have been so positive to recover from a broken back, but that would be a lie. It was the darkest, most horrible time I can remember.
I had lost my sparkle and spirit, and that is so much of who I am.
And once you lose that spirit, it is hard to recover.
I didn’t even know whether I would be strong enough to walk again – let alone climb or soldier again.
And as to the big question of the rest of my life? That was looking messy from where I was.
Instead, all my bottomless, young confidence was gone.
I had no idea how much I was going to be able to do physically – and that was so hard.
So much of my identity was in the physical.
Now, I just felt exposed and vulnerable.
Not being able to bend down to tie your shoelaces or twist to clean your backside without acute and severe pain, leaves you feeling hopeless.
In the SAS I had both purpose and comrades. Alone in my room at home, I felt like I had neither. That can be the hardest battle we ever fight. It is more commonly called despair.
That recovery was going to be just as big a mountain to climb as the physical one.
What I didn’t realize was that it would be a mountain, the mountain, that would be at the heart of my recovery.
Everest: the biggest, baddest mountain in the world.
CHAPTER 69
Sometimes it takes a knock in life to make us sit up and grab life. And I had just undergone the mother of all knocks.
But out of that despair, fear and struggle came a silver lining – and I didn’t even know it yet.
What I did know was that I needed something to give me back my hope. My sparkle. My life. I found that something in my Christian faith, in my family and also in my dreams of adventure.
My Christian faith says that I have nothing ever to fear or worry about. All is well.
At that time, in and out of hospital, it reminded me that, despite the pain and despair, I was held and loved and blessed – my life was secure through Jesus Christ.
That gift of grace has been so powerful to me ever since.
My family said something very similar: ‘Bear, you are an idiot, but we love you anyway, for ever and always.