Many people already understand that a most unfortunate, but strangely unique event happened to me as a teen. This event led me to become your doctor and to have you all as my patients over the past thirty-three years.  I have shared the story with a handful of you personally but I am positive that many of you have no awareness of the sequence of events that led to our meeting. So I will briefly, once again, share the story that ends with this letter of retirement. The story of what led to the most enriching practice life with which I have been blessed.

 

I grew up in League City and Seabrook, and attended elementary school in League City as NASA came into existence.  In high school, I was athletically inclined, but was shot in the back by an unknown drive-by shooter.  I spent over two years in despair in the hospital and finally asked my parents to bring me home. I amazingly survived the incident only to find myself having to use a wheelchair for the rest of my life.  Many think that this would be a terrible thing to have happened, as did I, at the time. I will explain, however, why it was one of the greatest and most wonderful events to shape my life.

 

While I was in the hospital, I naturally became interested in medicine.  I was not sure if I was intelligent enough to be a doctor, but loved people and nevertheless, set that as my goal.  My plan was turbulent and fraught with many events and unexpected turns, but Podiatric medicine and surgery seemed the perfect solution for one confined to a wheelchair. So, I set out on a mission.  Thankfully, I received some the best training possible in medical school and surgical residency, returned home, and opened my practice.  That is how it began.