Happily Ever After: The Life-Changing Power of a Grateful Heart

by Sutter, Trista

  I’ve long admired Jenny’s humor, beauty, and zest for life from afar—especially after reading her best-selling books about motherhood and becoming a mother myself. She has a fun-to-watch, outrageous personality and a love for her son that is both undeniable and inspirational. In 2003, I was lucky enough to spend a day with her on the set of Less than Perfect, and my years-long admiration couldn’t help but grow.

  I was invited to do a cameo. A nervous wreck, I was way out of my element, but I decided to try to enjoy the opportunity I was being afforded in sharing space on a Hollywood set with comedians who made me laugh every week through my TV. Jenny had a recurring role that season as Dani, the best friend of the main character, Claude, played by the show’s star, Sara Rue. In the scene, Claude and Dani find me trying on wedding gowns in a bridal boutique—inspired by my real-life upcoming wedding. I will never forget how at ease I felt with the gracious and hysterical encouragement of Sara and Jenny, who must’ve been so annoyed with my complete lack of acting ability.

  Sometime later, I became friends with Jenny’s sister Amy, who married my and Ryan’s friend Dan Hinote. Other than their wedding, I haven’t had any connection to Jenny except maybe appearing in a tabloid in the same week. She has been a big influence, though. After seeing an interview with her for her autism organization, Generation Rescue, I found a wealth of knowledge on the website and proactively used it as a guide for individualizing the timing of my kids’ immunizations.

  Much later, I happened to come upon a blog post Jenny wrote called “. . . And I Lived Happily Ever After.” Sound familiar? Even though I hadn’t crossed paths with Jenny in quite some time, she graciously granted permission for me to reprint her piece here. Read below for a sweet example of being given a reason to smile.

  Circa 1980: When I was a little girl, I would walk around with my three Cabbage Patch dolls and practice being the greatest mom in the world. I was confident I would have three children and be married to Prince Charming and live happily ever after.

  The images in my head of what my future looked like were so real to me that I had trouble differentiating what decade I was in. If time machines were real, I wonder if I would go back to 1980 to tell Jenny to stop that foolish dream? Would I tell her that she would be divorced, have only one child who would be later diagnosed with something called autism and be left to financially cover all of the bills and caretaking on her own? Probably not. I prefer surprises anyway.

  Even though my fairy tale didn’t come true the way I imagined it, I was able to shift my thinking from victim to warrior. With age came realization that whatever cards I was dealt it was up to me to decide to live in a happily-ever-after state of mind or a woe-is-me one. Don’t get me wrong, I get in my fair share of pity parties, but my time spent in them lessens as I get older. I have also learned to focus on what I have instead of what I don’t have. My thoughts went from, “I never did have three kids” to “I’m so lucky to have just Evan.” I find the blessing in the fact that I don’t have to split my attention. I can spoil him with all the love in my heart. Sure, I would have loved two more, but to argue with reality is to argue with God.

  (Reprinted with permission from Splash by the Chicago Sun-Times)

  I, for one, love a good debate, but I agree with Jenny—attempting a debate with God is not my idea of intelligent. Throughout our lives, we may question how and why we end up where we end up, but only when we reach the different stops along our path can we look back and get our answers. We need to trust in the power of the big picture and accept that our expectations won’t always be realized as we envision them. As the athlete Maurice Setter once said, “Too many people miss the silver lining because they are expecting gold.”

  Life is full of delays and pit stops, accidents and detours. All we can do is hold on tight and appreciate the blessings that show up along the way—especially the ones that show up unpredictably and were put in place to give us the greatest joy.

  FATEFUL CHANGE

  As I’ve mentioned in numerous sections of this book, my husband is one of the most dedicated and honorable people I know—two of the many reasons why I love him and wanted him to be the father of my children. Drawn to doing something with his life that would allow him to keep his favorite community safe as well as stimulate him mentally and challenge him physically, he became a firefighter in Vail, Colorado. However, if his aspirations had panned out as he had hoped, his trajectory would’ve been very different—and I don’t believe it would’ve included our happy family. Instead of being admired by his adoring wife and children and dedicating himself to a community and career he loves, he most likely would’ve been admired by adoring fans of football and dedicating himself to a game he has loved since he was three years old.

  No, we don’t have a room in our house dedicated to the Broncos or a son named Walter Payton in honor of Ryan’s favorite player growing up, but nonetheless it’s a game Ryan has fond memories of and one that he consistently excelled at.

  After walking on (the term used when you have not been actively recruited) to the University of Colorado Buffaloes in 1993, he proved his worth to all the college scouts who hadn’t taken a chance on him, winning Special Teams Player of the Year three times, being named All-Conference and Defensive MVP, and to this day, still holding the record for the second most tackles in a season. A strong architecture student, Ryan knew he could follow in his father’s professional footsteps, but as a pick in the fifth round of the 1998 NFL draft, he decided to pursue his dream of playing professional football instead and signed with the Baltimore Ravens. His time there was short-lived, as he was released at the end of training camp, but he was quickly picked up by the Carolina Panthers and after ten weeks on the practice squad was put on the active roster. Listed as a starter in a game against the New York Jets, Ryan found himself on the field awaiting the opening kickoff. His first game with the world watching—one he had waited for nearly all his life, and after nine seconds, it was over.

  Ryan had dived out trying to trip up the player returning the kickoff and tore all the ligaments of his shoulder and his rotator cuff muscle clear off the bone. Two days later, he was in surgery and for the rest of the season, he was in rehab. Released when the season ended, he got picked up by the Seattle Seahawks but was released after a couple weeks. He ended his career after one season with the Barcelona Dragons in 2000, never having completely recovered from his initial injury.

  Had he not been injured on his very first play, I can’t imagine that he wouldn’t have continued to climb the NFL ladder of success (yes, I’m biased, but it’s true—he’s annoyingly good at everything he does!). As fate would have it, though, he decided to trade in his football helmet for a fire helmet, and thankfully so. His new path led him straight into my arms and straight into a profession that I know has directly benefited from his hardworking spirit. He has helped more people than I can count and has no plans to stop anytime soon, although he did have the chance back in 2004.

  Feeling more fit and healthy than he had in years, thanks to his training for the Ironman triathlon in Kona, Hawaii, Ryan got a second chance to make his NFL dreams come true. After pondering the odds that he could make a comeback in the world of football and redeem his nine-second history, he sent an e-mail to his previous sports agent, Peter Schaffer, to get his thoughts. Without hesitation, Peter reached out to his NFL contacts and heard back from the New Orleans Saints coaching staff. They remembered Ryan from his success with the CU Buffaloes and wanted to fly him out for a tryout with the coaches and scouts. He did so well that they invited him back for minicamp, where he impressed the decision makers so much that they planned to offer him a free-agent contract at the end of the second and final day.

  If only the universe had cooperated.

  During the first drill of the afternoon, Ryan took off running down the field to cover a punt and was stopped in his tracks. Unable to walk, he quickly realized that history was repeating itself. With only a few hours left of minicamp, t
he team’s medical staff confirmed that he wouldn’t be playing anymore that day or anymore, period. He had completely ruptured his Achilles tendon.

  There’s no way to know whether Ryan’s torn Achilles sent him down a better or a worse path in life. What I do know is that, over and over again, the universe nudged him toward redefining his occupational dreams, solidifying the answers to the questions of what he was meant to do and where he was meant to be. He was meant to be with me. He was meant to be a wonderful father to Max and Blakesley. He was meant to live in the Vail Valley and do his part to keep its residents safe. As the Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius said almost 2,000 years ago, “Accept whatever comes to you woven in the pattern of your destiny, for what could more aptly fit your needs?”

  I’m not always happy to have to kiss Ryan good-bye when he leaves for his forty-eight-hour shifts, but I will always be grateful for the change in his trajectory that caused our paths to cross and caused him to seek out a career in which he could literally lend a hand to those in need. I’d say all those he has helped would agree.

  SURVIVAL OF THE OPTIMIST

  J.R. Martinez (a fellow member of my Dancing with the Stars family who ended up doing much better than me) dreamed of playing in the NFL from a young age, just like my husband. It’s all he remembers wanting to do and all he put his energy into. In fact, he was so fixated on it that he lost focus on the big picture. Lacking certain academic credits, he was told by college faculty during a tour that he wouldn’t be eligible to play at the collegiate level for two years. Feeling as though he’d had his life’s passion stolen out from under his pigskin-stained fingertips, he stubbornly thought, “If I can’t play college sports, then I won’t go to college.”

  That summer, he sat around feeling sorry for himself. He’d just turned nineteen years old, and the worst thing that could have happened to him did. The. Worst. Thing.

  Or so he thought.

  While wasting away that summer on his couch, feeling that the whole world was against him, he saw a commercial that would change his life. The army was looking for a few good men and women to serve our great country. He remembered the recruiters who had visited his high school earlier that year, and he reached out to a couple of coaches he knew and respected who had been in the military. In speaking with them, he realized that he could give back to a country that had only the year before been terrorized on September 11, travel, earn money for college, and get the credits he needed to play four years of football. He decided that it was the perfect detour and he ended up enlisting.

  After basic training, J.R. reported to Fort Campbell, Kentucky. It was January 2003 and with American troops gearing up to invade Iraq, he knew going to war was a possibility—he just didn’t think he would be part of it. But a few weeks later, he received his orders—his unit would be deployed to the war zone—and by March he found himself looking out at the desert of Kuwait City.

  Early on, his unit’s assignment was relatively simple: patrolling the southern region of Iraq and escorting military personnel such as cooks and medics from point A to point B. On April 5, 2003, they received another routine assignment, but at the last minute their mission suddenly changed. J.R. found himself driving a Humvee in a convoy headed along a route that hadn’t been cleared. When the route changed, his world changed.

  Unknowingly, J.R. had driven over a roadside bomb—not only detonating it, but also detonating everything they had inside the vehicle, including extra fuel and ammunition. The force of the explosion ejected the other three soldiers from the truck and engulfed it in flames—with J.R. helplessly trapped inside, literally burning alive.

  Completely conscious, he suffered unspeakable pain for five of the longest minutes of his life. He could’ve easily succumbed to the temptation he was feeling to close his eyes and give in to his weakening body, but instead, he thought of his mother and made a choice to fight.

  You just hold on. You keep yourself alive! he told himself. He screamed and yelled at the top of his lungs to keep himself awake until he was finally pulled from the flames by two of his courageous sergeants.

  When the helicopter arrived to carry him to safety, he was immediately put into a medically induced coma and flown to a military hospital in Germany so he could receive treatment to ward off infection and repair his damaged lungs and internal organs from extreme inhalation injuries. He had also been burned over 34 percent of his body and required immediate surgery—the first of thirty-four he has had to date. Thirty-four surgeries.

  When he was stable, he was transferred to the Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas, where he was taken out of his induced coma. He had been asleep for three and a half weeks and was understandably confused, but through the sea of people with protective masks and gear on, he immediately recognized the tear-filled eyes of his mother, his sole inspiration to stay alive. Speaking his first words in almost a month, J.R. reminded his mother of what he had said when he left for Iraq: “One way or another, I’m going to come home.” And come home, he did. If only home had actually been his house and not the hospital room where he would stay for three months, or nearby living quarters that he would call home for three long years during his difficult recovery.

  He received excellent care, but it was intensely painful care, with daily treatments and frequent surgeries that were more incapacitating and excruciating than the explosion itself. He celebrated his twentieth, twenty-first, and twenty-second birthdays at Brooke Army Medical Center, where he learned all about the depths of depression and the stages of grief—especially the stage of anger.

  J.R. was angry that he would never be able to return to football or the military career that he had subsequently fallen in love with. When he saw his face for the first time, he was angry that he would have to live the rest of his life so visibly scarred in a world so based on looks. He was angry at the thought of never finding a wife or having children. He was angry that, even with his mother’s love and support, he felt completely alone.

  After all, no one would ever go through the same thing and understand him . . . ever. No one. No way.

  But as J.R. learned about six months after he was trapped in that fiery Humvee, he was anything but alone. With his mother’s help, he was finally able to see the light of positivity.

  “I don’t know why you and I don’t know why us,” she told him, “but we have to be strong. In time it will start to make sense.”

  When it finally registered that, like his mother, who had suffered greatly in her life, he had a choice, J.R. was presented with an opportunity. One of his nurses asked him to visit another patient who had also been injured in Iraq. She was hoping that J.R. could talk to him about the recovery process and let him know that he wasn’t alone. This fellow soldier was having a very difficult time. Although J.R. could easily empathize with his condition, he was apprehensive about entering his room, especially knowing how fragile he himself had felt at that early stage. The last thing J.R. wanted to do was to go in there and push this man further into his own darkness. But with a little encouragement from the nurse, he decided to give it a go and honor her request.

  As soon as he entered the room, J.R. noticed the darkness. The room was silent, the lights were off, and the blinds were closed. J.R. sensed this wasn’t just to protect the room from the sweltering heat of the Texas summer. After introducing himself, J.R. told the soldier why he was there, and they started a conversation about life, a conversation that lasted forty minutes longer than he expected. As J.R. left the room, he suggested that they talk again the next day.

  “I’d appreciate that,” his new friend said.

  What happened next was so simple and yet so profound—the wounded soldier turned on the lights and opened the curtains.

  At that moment, J.R. physically felt the impact of sharing his story. He knew that he had helped this new patient, whether it was to brighten his mood or brighten his perspective, and he wanted to do it again, and again, and again for whomever else he could help.

>   Every day, after J.R. completed his own treatments, he went on his rounds, visiting other patients. The opportunity to serve his country as a soldier had been taken away, but by sharing his experience with fellow patients, he realized that he still had the opportunity to serve and to inspire, and on a much more personal level.

  Thankfully for everyone who has come to know him or about him, J.R.’s ability to inspire has grown far past the walls of the hospital. He became a motivational speaker; an actor on the daytime drama All My Children, in which he was cast in the role of an actual veteran; the winner of the thirteenth season of Dancing with the Stars; the author of a best-selling memoir, Full of Heart: My Story of Survival, Strength, and Spirit; and now the host of his own Newstalk radio show. To date, J.R. has shared his story with millions of people, and I have no doubt he’ll touch millions more lives in the years to come.

  Through his tragic experience, J.R. found meaning, just as his mom once assured him he would. With a purpose bigger than himself, he connects to others daily, letting them know that they have a choice in life. He tells people that you can choose to see your circumstances as a curse or a blessing, regardless of whether you usually lean toward optimism or pessimism. And after living through the stuff that nightmares are made of, J.R. Martinez has had every reason to succumb to the anger and pain and darkness and exist as a pessimist for the rest of his life. Instead, he has chosen to see the explosion as a blessing. He has chosen to survive and thrive, to be grateful and inspire. With the help of his mother and the flick of a light switch, J.R. made a choice to fight for himself and for other victims instead of fighting against his circumstances and the world.

  And if he can, we all can.

  A BODY OF BLESSINGS