Turning points

WE GOT TO SUCH LENGTHS TO STAY HEALTHY. BUT STRANGELY, IT IS WHEN WE LOSE OUR HEALTH THAT AMAZING THINGS CAN CAN START TO HAPPEN.

Peaks and Valleys

Sarah Olson's Story

Sarah Olson washed her clothes in the river and spread them on the rocks to dry. She was camping by herself in the Chattahoochee National Forest in Georgia. Naked and barefoot, Olson scanned the tall ledge behind her, hoping for a glimpse of a nearby waterfall. In peak physical condition at 31, she started climbing toward it easily, heedless of the height. A few feet from the top, she grabbed the cliff's edge as she searched for a foothold. But she couldn't find one. She was stuck--unable to climb forward or backward. Eventually her arm muscles gave out.

Olson fell nearly 100 feet and landed with such force on her buttocks that the shock wave shattered a vertebrae in the middle of her back. She punctured a lung and lost consciousness. She awoke about an hour later, judging by the sun, and couldn't feel anything in her lower body. She knew by her bloodied feet, though, that she was badly hurt. She passed out again. Olson lay there paralyzed and helpless for two days and two nights--during which the temperature dropped into the 40s. When rescuers found her, her body was so cold they couldn't get her temperature.

The accident left Olson, a 5-foot, 11-inch former model, a paraplegic. And yet she claims, "This accident isn't the worst thing that has happened to me."

Troubled Teen

Olson had grown up feeling unworthy and unloved. Her father was dismissive, her mother unaffectionate. She'd suffered hundreds of small hurts from her parents that added up to one huge wound of anger and wariness. One particular problem was her mother's obsession with her looks. She always wanted her daughter to dress up so she could show her off.

"You look so nice when you put makeup on," her mother hinted one evening when she was 16 and they were getting ready to go out to dinner with her stepfather.

Olson, who had just bought some expensive cover-up specifically to please her mother, hurried into the bathroom and concealed every single vein, freckle, and flaw she could see in the mirror. "There," she thought when she finished, "I look just like in the magazines. Mom will love it."

She walked into the living room, a shy smile on her face. "How do you like it?" she asked.

Her mother gazed at her, then dropped her eyes. She was clearly disappointed. Stricken, Olson left the room without a word.

As a result of this constant criticism and belittlement, Olson became rebellious. She ran away from home several times, became addicted to crack, and spent a month in a mental hospital.

Step by Step

At the time of her accident, Olson was feeling better about herself and had made progress toward a more stable life. She was two weeks away from departing for a semester in Germany and six credit hours short of a bachelor's degree in psychology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Ironically, though, it was her fall that brought her a fuller recovery.

About five months after the accident, Olson began attending a workshop in mindfulness meditation led by Patrick Thornton. Thornton teaches a type of Buddhist meditation that focuses on the present moment; it brings awareness to physical sensations in the body and to the way emotions arise and subside.

One evening, Thornton was explaining the program's concept--that overcoming the fear of pain can lead to the end of suffering. A retired couple in the group was having a hard time understanding the idea. Olson sat quietly across the room, listening to the discussion. Finally she spoke up.

"Not being able to walk really sucks. In the hospital, I couldn't think about the past, because that was me walking. And I couldn't think about the future, because that was me not walking, and both were torturous. All I could do was be in the precise moment; that was the only thing that was bearable," she said to the group.

Being in the moment meant giving in to the inevitable. "The pain was incredible, but there was nowhere else to go except into it," she explains. "I got the idea, 'Let me just see what's so bad about this pain that I'm trying not to feel.' So I plunged into the middle of it and swam around. I ate it and drank it and wore it. Once I took away the fear and loathing of it, it was just this innocent thing."

Having faced her greatest fear, Olson found a new capacity for compassion and forgiveness. She remembers vividly the night she forgave her father for not showing her the attention she craved as a child. Sitting across from him at the dinner table, she found herself seeing him through a different lens. "I looked at him from the viewpoint of a human who hasn't been hurt by him. I took away his father status. I forgave him," she says.

Later that evening in her apartment, she lit a candle in a holder that splintered the light into different patterns. "I looked at that candle and realized that's how people are; we all have this perfect, glowing God inside but the light shines out of us in different patterns," she explains. "Then it hit me; my dad has that exact same love in him, even though it comes out pretty distorted. In other words, I can trust that love because it comes from a source I trust."