Stronger Now: Story of a Recovering Alcoholic and Complete Tetraplegic

By Robert Luke Kincaid

Stronger Now provides an inside view of what one man experienced in trying to overcome an alcohol addiction and then sudden paralysis. He describes his thoughts and feelings during the recovery process, along with his newfound faith and relationship with God. This book emphasizes his struggles in detail and the way he persevered through the darkness of despair.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Oct 15, 2009
• ISBN: 9781449035471

Robert Luke Kincaid

Robert Luke Kincaid is an individual who was once on top of the world and had everything that he could ask for. He had a great job, fianc, an abundance of friends, and most importantly, a healthy body. He lived two separate lives; one as the alpha male of the crowd, and the other as an alcoholic. He was not the type of person that one could push very far without some type of ultimate intervention. He stood up for his friends and often adopted their problems, regardless if it resulted in physical violence or simply talking someone out of doing something irrational. Robert suddenly went from the top of the world to below the bottom in a matter of seconds. He was then faced with the biggest challenge of his life after becoming paralyzed, and was also hit with a very traumatizing piece of information from his former fiance. Robert struggled to overcome the loss of a child, his body, his fiance, and a normal way of life to become a better person than he was before his accident.

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© 2009 Robert Luke Kincaid. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

First published by AuthorHouse 10/9/2009

ISBN: 978-1-4490-3547-1 (ebk)

ISBN: 978-1-4490-3546-4 (sc)

Printed in the United States of America

Bloomington, Indiana

Contents

Preface

Living on the Edge: Foreshadowing

The Last Day

The Accident

The Hospital:

Operations and Experiences

The Prognosis

ICU Psychosis

Preparatory Maintenance

The Big Secret

A Turn for the Best

Additional Complications

My First Conversation

Contradicting Reality

Keeping an Eye on It

Hurry Up and Wait

The Transfer

Stage II?

The First Day

Those Same Four Walls

Rehab: Miracle Cure?

Anxious but Scared

Going Home

A Last Ditch Effort

Out of Sight, Out of Mind

An Awakening

My Grand Entrance

A Decision for the Best

Driving Mr. Kincaid

There’s No Place like Home

My New Best friend

I’m Driving Mr. Kincaid

A Bump in the Road

The Transition

References

Preface 

There are many things in life that happen for no other reason except that it was simply meant to be, or at least that’s what we tell ourselves when our search for a reason as to why it happened comes up empty. There might possibly be some truth in that old adage, but more often than we may realize, we were faced with a decision and made either the right or wrong choice. Some bad choices in life help us to learn from those experiences by enabling us to avoid those situations in the future. Other bad choices are not only learning experiences, but also everlasting experiences that we have to learn how to live with everyday. These are the ones that turn a person’s entire life upside down in the blink of an eye, and force the person to live with that bad decision for the rest of their lives. Occasionally when this happens, the person completely gives up on life and loses the will to live. They feel as if there is no reason for them to go on because the life they had before is gone forever. Their altered way of thinking causes a bad situation to get worse, and they live each day only to die.

The following pages of this book tell about the life experiences of a young alcoholic and the many different bad decisions that he makes. He was once on top of the world and had everything that one could ask for, but because of one of his bad decisions, the world that he was on top of suddenly crumbled beneath his feet. His world had been turned completely upside down, and he found himself spiraling out of control down the dark abyss of despair. After a near death experience and with the help of the Lord, he made the decision to not give up and die but to strive to become a better person than he was before. He vigorously fought his way through the restraining arms of a bad situation and beat the odds to become the sober, successful person he had always wanted to be, despite the fact that he was now paralyzed from the collarbone down. He proved not only to himself, but to everyone who knew his past, that he could overcome alcohol addiction, a broken heart, and then paralysis with a lot of determination and the healing hands of the Lord. This book portrays a daily record of events that occurred from the time of his paralysis through a three month period of hospitalization. During this period of hospitalization, he tells about his roller coaster emotions, newly formed bond of attachment with his mother, and how we made it through the darkness of a bad situation to become a person of stability and sound mind.

To D.M.W.

If there hadn’t been you

Living on the Edge: Foreshadowing  

In January 2005 I was forced to make a significant life decision to go back to school. I enrolled at the community college where I had previously taken law-enforcement training, and began the prerequisites for the Associates degree in nursing program. It felt good to be back in school. I had experienced the real world, and now had a good understanding of what I needed to do in order to be successful in life. I had high hopes of finishing the nursing program and perhaps even finding a new love. Lindsey and I were engaged the year before but it only lasted three months. I was tired of the on-again, off-again dating that we had been doing for so very long. When we broke up in June 2004, I moved to an apartment at the golf course and got a new cell phone number. I started dating someone else and was doing a pretty good job of staying away from Lindsey. Somehow she got my new cell phone number and began to call me. This came as a total shock to me when I saw her number pop up on my phone. While staring at her number a sinking, nauseating feeling came over me. Of course I didn’t answer the call, but I knew that she was probably going to leave a message. A new voicemail popped up on my phone, and I sat there for a long time debating on whether or not to check it. This not only made me sick, it also put me in a tight spot. My new flame was sitting right beside me on the couch when the call came in. While looking at the voicemail message and trying to keep from throwing up, I had to come up with an explanation as to why my ex would be calling me. The only explanation that I could give was the truth; I didn’t know. Of course she didn’t believe me, and I was accused of talking to my ex all the time. Still in a state of shock, I could not muster up any words to exchange an argument. She then left me sitting on the couch, gazing at my phone. That night, communication was re-established once again with my ex. It took me several days, but I finally smoothed everything over with my new flame and we continued to date until I went back to Lindsey in the fall of that year. Going back to her was a huge mistake and extremely poor judgment on my part. This unfortunate decision started the on-again, off-again dating once more that lasted until the spring of 2005.

As a student again, I behaved just like your typical college freshman. I studied a little and partied a lot. I was enjoying myself and began to meet new people; most of them girls! I was living with my best friend Justin, and finally had the perfect roommate. We got along great together. We were so much alike. We not only lived together, we did everything together. Whether it was playing golf, going on the river, hanging out at the cabin, or just going to a party; we did it all together. When I wasn’t in school, I was partying on the river every chance that I got. Mostly on Saturdays and Sundays but occasionally, I would skip school just to go on the river to relax and hang out with my friends. No matter where I was, there was always a crowd with or around me. On Friday afternoons starting at about three o’clock, my phone would ring continuously until late Sunday night. People would call wanting to know what was going on that weekend, or just to see what I was going to do. I would always come up with something for us to do even if I had to create a party. Everyone turned to me to make the plans, be the party, or find the party. I was living life to its fullest potential, as if each day was going to be my last. It was as if somewhere out of awareness in my unconscious mind, I knew that my time was limited. There was someone knocking at my door but I could not hear it. Or maybe I was living this way simply because I could. My mother was paying all of my bills and giving me money to spend. I had everything that I needed, and then some. Even with having everything on demand, my life still did not feel right without Lindsey. I covered up my feelings when I was with my friends. In front of them I had to be strong and be there for them if needed. I was the big brother or father figure in the group. I was there for them for anything they needed. My shoulder was cried on frequently, and I was constantly being consulted for advice about relationships. I never quite understood that because my relationship history was not what you would call up to par. I guess that by helping others it helped me through my hard times. It placed my problems on the back burner while I tried to fix someone else’s. In retrospect, it’s obvious that I played a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde type of role. I was strong and bulletproof by day, weak and emotional by night. I can recall lying in bed at night trying to reach Lindsey on the phone, and most of the time she wouldn’t answer so I would leave a message. If she did answer, I would usually end up begging her to spend time with me. Now that I’m no longer in that situation, it’s easy to understand why she was so hesitant to get involved with me again. I had done her wrong so many times that she obviously was permanently scarred. Many nights I would cry myself to sleep because she would refuse to let me see her. We were, however, secretly seeing one another so that her mother would not find out. Her mother had complete control over everything she did. The two of them shared a very strong relationship, far stronger than your ordinary mother-daughter relationship. After we had such a bad break up in 2004, I suppose that her mother was only trying to protect her from further harm. Even though this was a normal maternal response, it made it harder on both of us. We could not be seen together in public and if we were at a social function at the same time, she would act like she did not know me. This made everything worse, and it was extremely hard on me. What made the break up even more difficult for me was that one of my good friends, who was having an affair with a close friend of Lindsey’s, were both working together in destroying our relationship behind my back. They had told both Lindsey and her mother so many bad things about me (even though a very small amount of it was true, and had also told her mother that I was the father of another girl’s child despite the fact that I was not), that it was impossible to try and fix our relationship with them working so hard to tear it apart. (The two had even strategically orchestrated and implemented a plan to tell Lindsey’s mother everything that they could come up with about me, while he and I were at a job-related training one weekend. He had left the woman that he was having the affair with in charge of breaking the news to Lindsey’s mother that weekend. He did this so that it would not be so obvious about who the guilty party was because he and I would be together that weekend.) It finally got to the point where I could not take any more, so I would once again declare that enough was enough. I told her to just leave me alone because I was tired of having to hide our relationship, and I could not handle it anymore emotionally. This caused me to be severely depressed, and it was affecting my job. I consulted my primary care physician and requested that he give me something to take the edge off. He started me on the antidepressant Effexor, 75 mg once a day. Either it was not strong enough, or I just had it in my mind that it would be the miracle cure. I guess it did what it was supposed to by keeping me from doing anything drastic, but I was still far from being mentally stable. I eventually went back to work and continued to avoid any contact with Lindsey.

In May 2005, I was finishing up the spring semester and still living each day to the fullest. Some of my close friends planned a beach trip for Memorial Day weekend. It was also Morgan’s birthday, who was another close friend. I was really looking forward to getting away and spending time with my good friends. I had not talked to Lindsey in over a month, and I was starting to feel pretty good again about myself and how things were going. We left on a Thursday evening and headed towards the beach. As soon as I crossed the county line, I felt like a whole new person. I left all the recent bad memories at home, and was determined to have a good time. When we arrived at Morgan’s beach house, we began to unpack and started planning our weekend. There were probably 20 to 25 people who had come down with us to celebrate Memorial Day and Morgan’s birthday. Everybody in the group was real close. I just knew it was going to be a good weekend. We played cards, went surf fishing, grilled out, and went out at night to listen to beach music at a local restaurant. One of the girls that came down with us was Susan, who