By the time you’ve been through as many surgeries as I have, you’d think you’d get used to them. But there’s no such thing. Every surgery brings its own kind of fear, pain, and emotional weight. And sometimes, they come with a whole string of chaos in between.

My first cervical disc replacement was in December 2022. We had big plans for that Christmas – a road trip to Boise, Idaho, to spend the holidays with our oldest son and his girlfriend. But the pain in my neck and shoulders had gotten so severe that I could barely turn my head without shooting pain down my arm. Driving across the country was out of the question. It broke my heart to cancel, but I had to put my health first.

Instead, just after Christmas, our son and his beautiful girlfriend (who had her own injury from a snowboarding accident and was in a sling) flew out to be with us. I was barely ten days post-op, still bandaged, sore, and restricted in what I could do. But they came. And even though it wasn’t the holiday we had planned, it meant everything that they were there. We rang in the New Year together, all of us a little banged up, but together – and that made it beautiful.

As usual, my Crohn’s didn’t play nice with the healing process. Like almost every surgery I’ve had, my incision didn’t heal cleanly. I ended up with a hole at the site, and we had to monitor it carefully. But even with that complication, I healed faster than expected. My surgeon lifted my restrictions a full month early. It felt like a win – finally.

Then, just six months later, I broke my ankle.

A hard cast for four weeks, then a walking boot. I didn’t even get a real break between recoveries. And right in the middle of that, we took a trip to South Dakota with friends. We rented a big, beautiful house and spent time off-roading in UTVs.

Nathan and I were riding together when one of the UTVs tipped – on my side. We were going fast, and suddenly we were sideways. We both ended up with concussions, but I took the worst of it – massive hematomas up my right arm, a fractured elbow into the joint, and I was completely banged up.

Nathan brought me to the ER right away. They put me in a sling, gave me pain meds, and sent us back to the house. Later that night, everything took a turn. I stood up – and completely passed out. My blood pressure dropped so low that I collapsed right there in the room.

Nathan screamed for help. I was unresponsive, and by the time I came to, someone had already called an ambulance. I’ll never forget the look on his face. He was terrified. In that moment, he thought he had lost me. He later told me he had nightmares about it – about losing me that night – and for a long time after, those fears stayed with him.

He completely blamed himself for the accident. He had been the one driving, and no matter how many times I reminded him that it was just that – an accident – he carried it heavily. What people didn’t see was that while everyone was focused on me and my injuries, he was also dealing with a concussion and quietly falling apart inside. He was scared. He was hurting. And yet, he was still doing everything he could to take care of me.

That’s who Nathan is. He never stops showing up for me, even when he’s barely holding it together himself.

A month later, still in a sling, still recovering from the concussion, and unable to lift anything or drive, we took our already-planned road trip out west. Glacier National Park, Stanley, Idaho, Yellowstone. Nathan asked me again and again if I wanted to cancel. I refused. I didn’t want to miss another thing. I couldn’t help much, but I was there. Present. Still healing, still hurting, but determined.

Unfortunately, the accident made an already fragile situation worse. One of my discs had been on the verge of pressing against my spinal cord – and the trauma from the UTV crash pushed it over the edge. I started experiencing new symptoms, and it wasn’t long before I was diagnosed with spinal stenosis. The disc was fully pressing on my spinal cord. The second cervical disc replacement was scheduled for June 2024.

This surgery was different. It was urgent. And it was hard. My body was already so tired. The recovery was longer, heavier, and it came with a ripple effect – triggering other health issues, increasing migraines, and intensifying the symptoms I was already managing with menopause. It pushed my body past limits I didn’t even know I had.

Looking back now, I realize that chapter didn’t just test my physical strength – it revealed the depth of my husband’s love in a way I had never seen before. I still remember the fear in his eyes when I passed out that night. I saw how much he loves me, how much he carries that love, and how deeply he felt responsible – even when none of it was his fault.

To this day, when we talk about that second cervical disc surgery, he says it never should have happened. He believes it all spiraled from the accident. He blames himself for the pain I went through afterward – the migraines, the menopause symptoms, the ripple effects that touched every corner of our life. I’ve told him over and over that it wasn’t his fault. But I also understand why he feels that way. Because when you love someone that much, you feel everything with them – and sometimes, for them.

That season taught me what real love looks like. It’s not just standing beside someone when everything is easy. It’s holding them up when they’re broken – and somehow still feeling like you didn’t do enough. It’s crying in the dark when no one’s watching. It’s sharing the weight of something neither of you asked for, but refusing to let it break you.

This part of our story, as painful as it was, made our love stronger. And it reminded me that resilience isn’t always about pushing through alone. Sometimes, it’s about being held by someone who loves you too much to let you fall.