Planting HOPE
Michelle Halpin was awakened in the night by the call that no wife wants to answer. Her husband had been in an accident, and it wasn’t looking good. To top it off, they weren't even at home: they were at the World Dairy Expo in Madison, Wisconsin, several hours from their Illinois home. Her husband, Mike, and a friend were up late with the cows the night before the show and needed additional bales of hay stored in the livestock trailer. While Mike was unloading bales, his hand got caught on the twine and it pulled him from the trailer headfirst into the ground. He was rushed to a nearby hospital, where the surgeon discovered that Mike had dislocated his C5 and C6 vertebrae and suffered a spinal cord injury. As a result, he had no feeling or mobility from the middle of his chest down. “No one knew what we should expect. And the uncertainty of the situation was scary,” Mike says. the route to recovery
Due to challenges faced after surgery to realign the cervical vertebrae, Mike spent 30 days in the ICU at UW Health in Madison. During this time, he was able to indicate regained sensation in his legs, deeming his spinal cord injury ‘incomplete’ and opening the door for hope. “Based on the initial evaluation of the injury, even his main surgeon was shocked from these developments,” Michelle says. However, physical recovery was slow, and Mike and Michelle’s young family suddenly faced an unfamiliar set of daunting challenges. Mike was moved to the Shirley Ryan Ability Lab (SRAL) in Chicago to work with experts to get stronger and rebound from his injury. Not long after his stay, his sensation improved, and he began to move his toes, just enough to make the future seem bright.
20
National program helps farmers with disabilities keep their independence By Kelsey Litchfield and Kelly Gagnon
By early March, five months after his injury, Mike was bending his knees. This comeback in mobility influenced his team at SRAL to start gait training to reteach Mike's muscles how to walk and become stronger. Since returning home in May 2017, Mike continues to attend physical therapy sessions, which have allowed him to advance to walking with braces and a walker. “It’s been miraculous,” Michelle says. “He can do a lot more than anyone ever expected. And he’s always pushing himself to do more.” Michelle works from home, where she also helps take care of Mike. His mother drives him to therapy in Bloomington three times a week, and their sons Owen, 13, and Colt, 11, help with cattle chores, including running the tractor and grain carts. The Halpins have been overwhelmed by the support they’ve received from their friends, family, and community. “I’ve really learned not to be shy,” Mike says. “If you ask people for help, they understand for the most part. For the first month or two, that was the hardest for me.” adapting to a new way of farm life
It wasn’t long after his accident that Mike was itching to get home and back to the farm near Cullom, Illinois. Mike, alongside his dad, George Halpin, and uncle, William Halpin, farms about 4,000 acres of corn, soybeans, and hay and raises beef and dairy cattle. Thanks to a family friend, Mike learned about AgrAbility Unlimited of Illinois. AgrAbility partnered with the Illinois Assistive Technology Program to make the home adaptations needed for him to return home.
