Speaker 1: Really previously on symptomatic. Trent Fielder, a successful and vibrant
Speaker 1: insurance assessor, suddenly faced a life threatening battle out of nowhere.
Speaker 1: He began losing feeling in his arms and legs. The
Speaker 1: condition spread quickly, leaving him wheelchair bound with no sensation
Speaker 1: below the waist. Things worsened rapidly when his lungs began
Speaker 1: to fail, landing him in the ICU with a daunting diagnosis,
Speaker 1: gyond Beret syndrome GBS, an autoimmune disorder that attacks the
Speaker 1: nervous system.
Speaker 2: I was overwhelmed. I could not get my heart to
Speaker 2: slow down. The only things that I could think about
Speaker 2: were the negative things. My focus was on what I lost.
Speaker 2: You know, it was am I going to be able
Speaker 2: to go back to what I used to do? Not
Speaker 2: like this? But it was very much wrapped up in
Speaker 2: the I can't do this anymore.
Speaker 3: They said that this was progressive and that he wasn't
Speaker 3: going to make it. How do you process that?
Speaker 1: Even though Trent stabilized enough to return home to his wife,
Speaker 1: Nicole and their young twins, the doctors couldn't restore much
Speaker 1: of the mobility or feeling he'd lost overnight, despite trying
Speaker 1: every treatment protocol. Then out of nowhere, another flare struck,
Speaker 1: landing him back in the er fighting for his life.
Speaker 2: The pain was immense. The spasticity was just out of control.
Speaker 2: The spasitos were so bad. At some point in my
Speaker 2: neck my neck would try to snap itself. I couldn't
Speaker 2: keep it in control. My jaw would pop. It was
Speaker 2: very painful. So as the pain continued, the depression kicks in.
Speaker 2: The beer kicks in.
Speaker 1: With his symptoms lingering longer than expected, Trent received a
Speaker 1: new diagnosis, Chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy CIDP, a progressive autoimmune
Speaker 1: disease causing long term muscle weakness and fatigue. After exhausting
Speaker 1: treatment options with little improvement to his mobility, Trent made
Speaker 1: the tough decision to try a suggested spinal surgery, but
Speaker 1: unfortunately the outcomes were more devastating than hopeful.
Speaker 2: So in the surgery there were some decisions made by
Speaker 2: the surgeon that went against protocol for what you would
Speaker 2: do with that implant, and he ended up cutting into
Speaker 2: my t ten vertebra.
Speaker 1: How terrifying would it be to fight an unknown enemy,
Speaker 1: one you didn't recognize and didn't see coming what if
Speaker 1: that enemy was coming from within a disease that even
Speaker 1: doctors couldn't identify. Nearly half of all Americans suffered from
Speaker 1: some chronic illness, and many struggle for an accurate diagnosis.
Speaker 1: These are their stories, and Lauren write the CHECKO and
Speaker 1: this is symptomatic. Before we pick up with Trent's story,
Speaker 1: a quick warning. This episode mentions thoughts of suicide. Please
Speaker 1: proceed with care. Two years after Trent's symptoms first began,
Speaker 1: he was dealing with the aftermath of a failed spinal
Speaker 1: surgery meant to be a last ditch effort to restore
Speaker 1: some mobility. Through the darkest moments, Trent drew strength from
Speaker 1: his family, including his loyal service dog, Gunner, who never
Speaker 1: left his side. With his t ten vertebrae severed, he
Speaker 1: faced the risk of being paralyzed from the waist down forever.
Speaker 2: It wasn't until January twenty third, two thousand four where
Speaker 2: I realized just how bad of a mistake he had made.
Speaker 2: And that was when I ended up having two embolisms
Speaker 2: back to back. And I was at home at the
Speaker 2: time for the first one at least, but I realized
Speaker 2: at the time I had a full breath in, and
Speaker 2: with that full breath, I heard a calm, very peaceful
Speaker 2: voice that said not yet. And immediately I became aware
Speaker 2: of the fact that, Okay, I'm about to go through something,
Speaker 2: but I'm not going to do it alone, and I'm
Speaker 2: going to be okay.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 2: But I had a full breath then, and I realized
Speaker 2: that that was my last breath. I've had the opportunity
Speaker 2: to talk to people about what that last breath looks like.
Speaker 2: And it was like seeing the world through a stained
Speaker 2: glass window. It was absolutely remarkable. And when Nicole again
Speaker 2: Nicole is stunningly gorgeous, but when she came in the
Speaker 2: room for me to show her my phone, she was listening.
Speaker 2: You know. It was kind of like seeing the ocean
Speaker 2: off the sunrise. And so Nicole came in and I
Speaker 2: had my phone and I'd put on there I cannot breathe,
Speaker 2: Please stay call nine one one. She did two of
Speaker 2: the three, the staying calm parts. She can't of skipped
Speaker 2: that part. She went into full action. We had just
Speaker 2: put the babies to bed, so she called nine one one.
Speaker 3: I got like really nervous, and thank god, the ambulance
Speaker 3: had like a bogus phone call kind of nearby, because
Speaker 3: they were at the house fairly quickly, and they got.
Speaker 2: To us within two minutes.
Speaker 1: Wow that I mean that in the voice that sounds
Speaker 1: like divine intervention.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there were a lot of things that had to
Speaker 2: happen and they can't all be circumstanced and for me
Speaker 2: to be able to calmly get through that time. So
Speaker 2: they got there right as I was finishing that last breath.
Speaker 2: They gave me a shot of something in my neck
Speaker 2: and then started taking me to the hospital. And at
Speaker 2: that point Nicole broken down. So she came over to
Speaker 2: the aim and you know, she sees tubes and everything else,
Speaker 2: and it was more than she had ever seen before.
Speaker 2: But I reached over and grabbed her hand and I said,
Speaker 2: we're not going anywhere. It's going to be okay. I
Speaker 2: was told it was going to be okay, So it's
Speaker 2: gonna be okay. Then I got to the hospital and
Speaker 2: the second one happened, and you flatlined a flat line,
Speaker 2: and I wasn't gone very long.
Speaker 1: Due to its inflammatory nature and the resulting lack of mobility,
Speaker 1: CIDP presents a higher risk for blood clotting issues like embolisms.
Speaker 1: After everything Trent had been through. He and his family
Speaker 1: faced his most severe reaction yet, pushing him to the
Speaker 1: edge of death.
Speaker 2: And so I woke up being angry. I didn't really
Speaker 2: know what I was angry at, but I wasn't angry
Speaker 2: because of the condition. I wasn't angry at a doctor
Speaker 2: or anything in particular. They put me in the ICU
Speaker 2: and I was in there for a lot long time.
Speaker 2: This is probably a few days into it. I was
Speaker 2: down to about eighteen percent of my lungs. I could
Speaker 2: really just barely breathe on my own.
Speaker 3: That was kind of scary, and it's kind of like, well,
Speaker 3: if you're a lung scamp function I can put two
Speaker 3: or two together. That means you can't breathe, and then
Speaker 3: if you can't breathe, you're not going to be living.
Speaker 2: And there were these three doctors that came in. They
Speaker 2: are the ones that looked me over while I was
Speaker 2: in there, and they sat down and they said they
Speaker 2: needed to talk to me, and you know, that's never
Speaker 2: a good starting point to a conversation when it's a doctor.
Speaker 2: And they said, there's not anything more that we can
Speaker 2: do for you. So there's nothing more we can do
Speaker 2: to reverse the effects, sort of make this better. So
Speaker 2: they had come to a conclusion that they were going
Speaker 2: to send me home and that they would set me
Speaker 2: up on hospice at home.
Speaker 3: His doctors were all telling him that he was going
Speaker 3: to die. What kind of patient wants to hear that?
Speaker 3: That's crazy and nobody can predict the future, and he
Speaker 3: was like, I have too much to live for. He's
Speaker 3: just like, get on board or get out of here.
Speaker 1: Being sent home for hospice, Trent refused to accept that
Speaker 1: this was the end of his fate. However, having deteriorated
Speaker 1: so much physically, proving the doctor's wrong would not come
Speaker 1: without its challenges. So on top of all the health issues,
Speaker 1: what was your greatest fear at that point?
Speaker 3: That he would have killed himself and then I would
Speaker 3: like walk into a body in blood on the floor.
Speaker 3: That crazy, but yeah, I've thought of that once and twice.
Speaker 2: My doctor was right. I was not prepared for the
Speaker 2: flood of emotions, and you know, it was like seeing
Speaker 2: the events that had happened to me, like America around
Speaker 2: It was just and I couldn't make it stop. And
Speaker 2: so there were times when the emotions were really too
Speaker 2: overwhelming and there was one particular time where I'd considered
Speaker 2: an almost carried out, taking my own life back home.
Speaker 1: Trent sank into the depths of his desperation, but it
Speaker 1: would be his faithful service dog, Gunner, who would prove
Speaker 1: that there was a reason for hope.
Speaker 2: I planned it enough out where no family was going
Speaker 2: to be around, nobody was going to be around me.
Speaker 2: I'd be able to just cut the story short. Essentially,
Speaker 2: there was a gun that was next to me and
Speaker 2: a bag, and I reached over to grab the gun
Speaker 2: and it wasn't there anymore. And I looked back and
Speaker 2: Gunner had He had jumped up on the bed where
Speaker 2: I couldn't hear him, and he had crawled to it
Speaker 2: and took it away. And I looked right at him,
Speaker 2: and he had it in his mouth. There was no
Speaker 2: risk or anything to him, but he never lost eye
Speaker 2: contact with me. He constantly looked at me while he
Speaker 2: had this in there. His tail was not wagging. It
Speaker 2: wasn't a game to him. He knew that this didn't fit.
Speaker 2: So I tried to reach back further for him, and
Speaker 2: he took steps back. And I tried to reach further back,
Speaker 2: and he'd take steps back but never lost that contact.
Speaker 2: He just kept backing up. And I eventually reached a
Speaker 2: point where I was just exhausted mentally and physically, and
Speaker 2: I just fell down to the ground. And at that
Speaker 2: point I was crying, and he knew that that was
Speaker 2: what needed to happen, and he came up to me
Speaker 2: and nestled up against me, and he never left me.
Speaker 2: They just stayed right there.
Speaker 1: What a beautiful story. Trend's condition had reached its lowest point,
Speaker 1: with his lung capacity now at life threatening levels and
Speaker 1: no treatment options left to counter the degeneration. He knew
Speaker 1: he needed a fresh perspective from a new medical team.
Speaker 1: If things were going to get better, it would be
Speaker 1: up to him to dig deep and find a strength
Speaker 1: he hadn't found before.
Speaker 2: I think that the anger of allowing a disease to
Speaker 2: take control of my mindset, to take control of my heart,
Speaker 2: my future as a husband, as a father, as a
Speaker 2: friend of a son, that was where I was like,
Speaker 2: I've allowed it to control me for too long, and
Speaker 2: so that has to stop.
Speaker 1: We'll be right back with Symptomatic, a Medical Mystery Podcast.
Speaker 1: Now back to Symptomatic a Medical Mystery Podcast. Trent had
Speaker 1: followed all the doctor's orders, trying every possible medicine and
Speaker 1: physical therapy approach, but only seeing temporary relief and minor
Speaker 1: recovery from his pain and partial paralysis. After a failed
Speaker 1: spinal surgery and two embolisms that caused him to flatline,
Speaker 1: Trent still refused to accept defeat and was determined to
Speaker 1: find a path to recovery. This turning point started with
Speaker 1: the guidance and support of his mother's primary care physician,
Speaker 1: who helped carve out a possible treatment plan, paving the
Speaker 1: way for a different approach to physical therapy.
Speaker 2: She is an incredible woman. She is an amazing heart,
Speaker 2: a giving person. She has gone far and above what
Speaker 2: I thought any other doctor would do to help me.
Speaker 2: She's coordinated my care. You know, she's kept the other
Speaker 2: doctors honest, I guess, is what I would say. So
Speaker 2: she's kept him in line to make sure that everybody
Speaker 2: is talking and on the same page about my care.
Speaker 2: When you think of an advocate patient advocate, she is
Speaker 2: absolutely at the top of the list of the best
Speaker 2: ones out there, and that never so that's exactly who
Speaker 2: she is and who she'll always be. It is just
Speaker 2: it's just her heart.
Speaker 1: First on Trend's list was rebuilding his lung capacity. To
Speaker 1: do that, he turned to an unexpected life saving tool music.
Speaker 1: It helped him retrain his lungs and find his breathing rhythm.
Speaker 1: It also gave him a way to block out everything
Speaker 1: else going on around him.
Speaker 2: Music had always been very important to me and helped
Speaker 2: me get through some difficult times in my life. And
Speaker 2: I realized that I can use that music to retrain
Speaker 2: my lungs on a gradual basis to make them stronger.
Speaker 1: So you decided, I'm not accepting this and that's not
Speaker 1: the way it's going to be. I'm going to train
Speaker 1: myself to breathe again. I'm going to train myself period.
Speaker 1: So what does that process look like and what kind
Speaker 1: of advances do you start seeing?
Speaker 2: As I grew stronger in that, I was developing these
Speaker 2: kind of mental programming to find out the best ways
Speaker 2: to rehabilitate what I could rehabilitate my side, what I
Speaker 2: had control over, whether I thought about it at the time,
Speaker 2: I was empowering myself to improve and take control again
Speaker 2: of the situation that was completely spiraling out of control.
Speaker 2: So I focused on that. So the pain is still
Speaker 2: there by using the music to guide my way through
Speaker 2: the pain, to breathe and to cope and function at
Speaker 2: a higher level.
Speaker 1: Trent worked diligently to increase his lung capacity to thirty
Speaker 1: one percent, a significant step forward, but he didn't stop there.
Speaker 1: He was already focusing on his next physical therapy goal,
Speaker 1: setting the bar even higher. That mindset of always pushing
Speaker 1: for more has been a constant in his recovery.
Speaker 2: Decision that I wanted to go beyond just functioning. I
Speaker 2: wanted to excel and how am I going to do
Speaker 2: that with a body that's attacking itself. I'm fortunate that
Speaker 2: I follow kind of both sides of the traditional medicine
Speaker 2: has been very supportive, but I push it to its
Speaker 2: limits with what I do. Because I decided to go
Speaker 2: through a program which is the Adaptive Training Foundation, and
Speaker 2: I was invited to be a part of their class
Speaker 2: with a number of people that are a lot of
Speaker 2: wounded vets and first responders, people that have had traumatic
Speaker 2: injuries that they've gone through or been born with certain conditions.
Speaker 2: And it was such an incredible blessing to be given
Speaker 2: that opportunity.
Speaker 3: After he went to ATF, because you know, he had
Speaker 3: friends but he didn't really have like a good set
Speaker 3: of people around him and stuff, and so he calls
Speaker 3: them his tribe and they have like a whole big
Speaker 3: tribe mentality of this is your people, we got your back,
Speaker 3: and so that was really the turning point for him.
Speaker 1: At the Adoptive Training Foundation or atf Trent found a
Speaker 1: supportive community of people facing similar challenges and working through
Speaker 1: their own recoveries. It was there he met his new trainer,
Speaker 1: Sean Fitzmorris, who would play a crucial role in helping
Speaker 1: him take the next steps in his recovery.
Speaker 4: A lot of doctors, they are dealers of reality and
Speaker 4: what science has shown them, our studies have shown them,
Speaker 4: and they just rely on those soul things. And I
Speaker 4: think that doctors do not want to be responsible for
Speaker 4: if they were to say, hey, yes you'll walk again,
Speaker 4: or hey, yes you're going to get this back and
Speaker 4: you're going to be able to do these things in life,
Speaker 4: because I don't think they want to over promise things
Speaker 4: to them, you know. I think they want to be
Speaker 4: as real as possible, which I think it can work
Speaker 4: both ways, right, So they need to face the reality
Speaker 4: and really looking in the eye and say this is
Speaker 4: my truth right now. But my thing is that your
Speaker 4: truth in a moment, maybe at that time, but it's
Speaker 4: not your truth for your entire future. You're going to
Speaker 4: create your own path, You're going to create your own truth.
Speaker 4: You're going to create your own destiny with your own
Speaker 4: unique abilities.
Speaker 2: We all meet people that are able to bring things
Speaker 2: out in us and help show things in us that
Speaker 2: make us stronger. Jean, he has that ability to bring
Speaker 2: things out on you in the moment when you need
Speaker 2: it most, when you're about ready to quit, right when
Speaker 2: you're exhausted and think you can't do one more thing,
Speaker 2: Sean finds a way to get under your skin so
Speaker 2: that you're going to persevere through it.
Speaker 1: Still paralyzed from the waist down, Trent had been searching
Speaker 1: for someone to help him believe there was more to
Speaker 1: his life and mobility than what he'd come to accept
Speaker 1: over the past few years. Sean stepped in and began
Speaker 1: showing him the possibilities, but they both knew they had
Speaker 1: to start with the small things first. Did he have
Speaker 1: any specific goal or did you you have an initial
Speaker 1: goal for him when you first started to work together.
Speaker 2: Well, his goal he wanted to walk.
Speaker 4: He had had some sea braces made that provided like
Speaker 4: an electrical impulse when he walked, to get that feedback
Speaker 4: through his legs. But he wanted to be able to
Speaker 4: walk without the braces. And the thing is with the
Speaker 4: braces too, it creates atrophies. So then those muscles really
Speaker 4: aren't firing on their own. You know, they've got so
Speaker 4: much stability and support from the braces that they can't
Speaker 4: do the job they need to do.
Speaker 1: So the brace has become a crutch.
Speaker 4: Literally, they become a crutch.
Speaker 2: Literally.
Speaker 4: He was like a baby deer, but even like a
Speaker 4: baby deer in a frozen pond, and we stayed very
Speaker 4: very close to him. He was just the fear of following.
Speaker 4: His legs were super atropheed but also super weak. They
Speaker 4: weren't stable. But we started with foundational movements, a lot
Speaker 4: of things. You know, you can't just go right from
Speaker 4: being in a wheelchair to now, let's stand up and walk.
Speaker 4: There's so many more things we had to work on,
Speaker 4: just ground based stuff, you know, getting them all fours,
Speaker 4: getting even quadruped, working on his core, working on a
Speaker 4: lot of the small things, working on crawling, working on balance.
Speaker 4: A lot of times people get so focused on the
Speaker 4: end goal, and they get frustrated with the small things
Speaker 4: we need to do along the way to get them there.
Speaker 1: More than five years after his sudden paralysis, Trent finally
Speaker 1: found a like minded community and an approach that began
Speaker 1: to show real progress. By shifting his mindset beyond his
Speaker 1: original prognosis and finding the right support system to guide
Speaker 1: his training, he was determined to meet his goal of
Speaker 1: walking again.
Speaker 2: We figured out how to get me up on my
Speaker 2: feet and doing it very unconventionally with golf balls, PBC,
Speaker 2: pipe and cape. We kind of out scienced the science
Speaker 2: because I couldn't feel my legs. It's like, okay, well
Speaker 2: your legs are basically shock ofs orbers for your spine,
Speaker 2: and so I needed to find a way to take
Speaker 2: how the shot dissipates, and I needed not to dissipate.
Speaker 2: I needed to go up to my hips where I
Speaker 2: could feel. We're just trapping all this stuff together. I mean,
Speaker 2: it was kind of a guyver for rehabilitation.
Speaker 3: So they're kind of like bracing him and then he
Speaker 3: asks like crutches, and I'm just walking home, kind of
Speaker 3: amazed that he's using the crutches. He's upright, he's walking forward.
Speaker 2: I was taking not big steps, smaller steps, but I
Speaker 2: was making sure that my feet would pound on the
Speaker 2: ground as best I could. But I could feel my hips.
Speaker 2: It's like a pattern, and I could follow. And I
Speaker 2: reached the end of the street and then turned around
Speaker 2: and Fitz was there, and Ari was one of my
Speaker 2: other trainers. Since she was there, I can't hear anything
Speaker 2: that they're saying because I have the headphones on and
Speaker 2: the music going. I have no concept of how loud
Speaker 2: I am. And as we start going back, I was
Speaker 2: just like, you know what, I'm gonna fall. I'm gonna fall.
Speaker 2: So I dropped one of.
Speaker 3: The crutches and then he like, he goes ahead and
Speaker 3: he drops the other crutch and just kind of like,
Speaker 3: what is this guy doing?
Speaker 2: So again, I can't feel my legs. I've got no
Speaker 2: appropriate perception, so I have to look down. I have
Speaker 2: to look at my legs, and that's what I was doing.
Speaker 2: And there, I guess it is screaming at me essentially
Speaker 2: in the background, and I can't hear anything.
Speaker 3: And then he pushes his trainers away and then he
Speaker 3: freaking takes steps and walks towards me and gives me
Speaker 3: a great big hug. You know, Like I said, he
Speaker 3: is one determined son of a gun. Do you tell
Speaker 3: him now, He's going to be like, oh yeah, you
Speaker 3: just wait.
Speaker 2: And I think it was probably another twelve or thirteen
Speaker 2: steps before I realized and I looked at him. Shawn's
Speaker 2: just right there.
Speaker 4: And you know, it's kind of like forced up when
Speaker 4: he starts running. His braces are flat off.
Speaker 2: And he just said, you're doing it, man, You're doing it.
Speaker 2: You're doing it. And I read his lips and I
Speaker 2: looked at it and I just fell apart. I just collapsed,
Speaker 2: and he caught me and I'd done it, and there
Speaker 2: were people well to celebrate the whole thing. I just cried.
Speaker 4: It was a very emotional moment looking on and it's
Speaker 4: still you get the happy tears going when you see it.
Speaker 4: It was a powerful moment and it's just a huge
Speaker 4: milestone for him to reach on that day.
Speaker 2: Oh gosh, five years, ten months, twenty five days, and
Speaker 2: five and a half hours, I'm never going to forget
Speaker 2: that minute.
Speaker 1: You talked about he had lost his purpose for a
Speaker 1: period of time, and you'd said that life for a
Speaker 1: while was kind of like a shit show, and so
Speaker 1: would you say that once he found atf he found
Speaker 1: a new purpose.
Speaker 3: I think I think he was surrounded by a lot
Speaker 3: of people who encouraged him. And it's so easy to
Speaker 3: say you can't do this, or you won't do this,
Speaker 3: or this is never going to happen, and it's like,
Speaker 3: if you hear it so often, even if it's not
Speaker 3: the truth, that becomes the truth. So when you have
Speaker 3: people speaking positivity into your life, saying, hey, it doesn't
Speaker 3: matter X, Y or Z, you can do this, you
Speaker 3: can fight, you can push.
Speaker 5: So I just think that was just a really.
Speaker 3: Good group of people to continually speak positivity and to
Speaker 3: kind of get him in the right mindset to make
Speaker 3: positive changes and believe in himself and keep on going
Speaker 3: from there.
Speaker 1: In typical Trent fashion, just walking wasn't enough. With a
Speaker 1: renewed sense of hope, he set his sights on an
Speaker 1: even bigger goal, completing a half iron Man. While his
Speaker 1: training team suggested waiting twelve to eighteen months, Trent had
Speaker 1: other plans. He signed up for the first race he
Speaker 1: could find just a few months away. So, for those
Speaker 1: not familiar, tell me what a half iron man intail?
Speaker 2: Else, half iron man is a seventy point three mile distance,
Speaker 2: which is one point two miles swim, it's a fifty
Speaker 2: six mile bike, and then a thirteen point one mile run,
Speaker 2: or in my case at the time, it was a
Speaker 2: racing chair. That makes up for the fact because I
Speaker 2: couldn't run, and I did pretty well in the swim.
Speaker 2: On the bike, I was seventeen miles in. It's a
Speaker 2: very interesting picture contrast at miles sixteen, I'm like on
Speaker 2: top of the world. Mile seventeen you could see it
Speaker 2: runt in my face because I had actually torn both
Speaker 2: my rotator cuffs and.
Speaker 1: Biceps before you even get to the running chair.
Speaker 2: Right before I give the runna chair, before I was
Speaker 2: even a third of the way through the bike.
Speaker 1: How did you keep going?
Speaker 2: I think one of the most important things of life,
Speaker 2: in this case, certainly, but in every case, is to
Speaker 2: know your why. And when you know your why in life,
Speaker 2: then you really become a force of nature. You can
Speaker 2: be unstoppable. And I knew why I was there. There
Speaker 2: was no way that I could quit, no matter how
Speaker 2: much it hurt, because the bike is a hand cycle,
Speaker 2: so I'm using my arms the whole time. But I
Speaker 2: had to be able to keep going because I was
Speaker 2: doing it for Hope. I made it to the very end,
Speaker 2: about point two miles out, and that was when I
Speaker 2: felt the calling. And it was when I heard the
Speaker 2: voice was the rise and walk. I'm like, oh, I
Speaker 2: was like, are you sure, God, because I could just
Speaker 2: coast him. But I ended up getting up. I gets
Speaker 2: some help and I was able to not just walk
Speaker 2: across the finish line. I had a small jog.
Speaker 3: He said he heard God tell him get up, and
Speaker 3: so he physically got up out of that thing, and
Speaker 3: then he ended up walking and then running the last
Speaker 3: like tenth of a mile.
Speaker 2: And I did it. I had my headphones on, I
Speaker 2: was looking straight down the whole time. I collapsed as
Speaker 2: soon as I got across the finish.
Speaker 5: Line, and everybody was like what this paralyzed too.
Speaker 3: Just got up and ran across the finish line and
Speaker 3: my dad caught him and our friend Adam, and it
Speaker 3: was pretty amazing.
Speaker 5: And then in the video and Abia's like, go.
Speaker 3: Daddy go, go Daddy go, and.
Speaker 2: It started something. People were videoing it and posting it
Speaker 2: and sharing it because they just couldn't believe what they
Speaker 2: were seeing. And probably about thirty five forty minutes from
Speaker 2: the time I got my medal to getting to the car.
Speaker 2: By the time I got to the car, I had
Speaker 2: almost eleven hundred messages on Facebook, and I had probably
Speaker 2: about half that in friend requests, and the majority of
Speaker 2: them being vets and first responders and people just needing hope.
Speaker 2: And it just continued to grow. And that's how I
Speaker 2: spent the last years doing what I'm doing, never doing
Speaker 2: it for myself. This can't ever be about me. If
Speaker 2: it is, i'd find a reason to quit. And the
Speaker 2: mission has always been hope. So I've done half iron Man,
Speaker 2: iron Man, I've done USA Triathlon, I've won national championships
Speaker 2: that way.
Speaker 1: Trent has since completed multiple endurance events, including representing Team
Speaker 1: USA as the only para athlete in last Summer's Triathlon
Speaker 1: World Championships in Australia. He doesn't push himself for accolades
Speaker 1: or medals which he gives away to others. He does
Speaker 1: it to physically pass on his message of hope wherever
Speaker 1: he goes. His loving kids, Logan and Nevayah understand this
Speaker 1: more than anyone. Why is your dad different from other dads?
Speaker 6: He has been paralyzed from the waist down for a
Speaker 6: long time, and that he wants to give people hope
Speaker 6: and he runs iron Man's and gives his metals away
Speaker 6: to other people.
Speaker 1: What are you most proud of when you think of
Speaker 1: your dad?
Speaker 7: Probably him being able to do all these things while
Speaker 7: having treatments and surgeries and taking care of stuff around
Speaker 7: the house as well, like being able to do iron
Speaker 7: mans and all these races, and like still being able
Speaker 7: to be there for us, like as a dad. You know,
Speaker 7: him being able to walk after people told him he
Speaker 7: wouldn't be able to is like probably the most aspiring thing.
Speaker 1: And Nicole, what do you hope people take away from
Speaker 1: hearing Trent's story?
Speaker 3: Hopelessness is such a disease, and it's kind of like,
Speaker 3: if you don't have hope, what do you have? Whatever
Speaker 3: the situation is, there's always light at the end of
Speaker 3: the tunnel, regardless of how dark it may seem.
Speaker 2: Now, if people can understand that, there are going to
Speaker 2: be moments in our life that generate suffering, but the
Speaker 2: question is what do we do with it? What are
Speaker 2: we able to do with it? If it's too difficult
Speaker 2: or it feels too overbearing to make a change in
Speaker 2: our life, then do it a different way by making
Speaker 2: a change in somebody else's, by impacting somebody else's. And
Speaker 2: I could have never imagined the things that have occurred
Speaker 2: with me. I mean, how can I imagine going from
Speaker 2: the guy to flatlines on a table to a go
Speaker 2: medalist in ten years? And people constantly they'll ask you, Rocker,
Speaker 2: what did it feel like to hold the metal? I'm like,
Speaker 2: the metal is not the message. Help is the message.
Speaker 2: And I think that's what I would like people to
Speaker 2: best understand, whether it's through this podcast or through my life,
Speaker 2: is that no matter what, and no matter how long
Speaker 2: of a road that it took, I chose hope, and
Speaker 2: I choose that for everybody.
Speaker 1: Always looking to pay it forward. Trent gave his gold
Speaker 1: medal from this Summer's Triathlon World Championships to his wife, Nicole,
Speaker 1: who has been his steadfast supporter from the beginning. You
Speaker 1: can also be a part of his message of hope
Speaker 1: and keep up with his next adventure at Trentfielder dot com.
Speaker 1: Special thanks to Chive Charities for the work they do
Speaker 1: with veterans and those living with rare diseases and the
Speaker 1: impact they've had on Trent's story. If you know someone
Speaker 1: who might benefit from hearing his story or other stories
Speaker 1: in this season of Symptomatic, we encourage you to share
Speaker 1: it with them. And knowing that health struggles can often
Speaker 1: be a marathon instead of a sprint, if you want
Speaker 1: to help others cross the finish line, consider paying it
Speaker 1: forward like Trent has by donating to his nonprofit at
Speaker 1: Trhope dot org. That's trii Hope dot org or Chive
Speaker 1: Charities at chive Charities dot org.
Speaker 2: My name is Trent Fielder. I was diagnosed with Giambore
Speaker 2: syndrome in twenty eleven and in twenty twelve I was
Speaker 2: diagnosed with chronic inflammatory demolinating polyueropathy. I went from flat
Speaker 2: lining on an emergency room table to eventually working to
Speaker 2: train myself how to breathe, how to walk. Eventually took
Speaker 2: on a mission to compete, and that competition led me
Speaker 2: from flat line to finish line. And that finish line
Speaker 2: was gold medal at the World Championships this past year
Speaker 2: with Team USA.
Speaker 1: As we close out the season of Symptomatic, we want
Speaker 1: to take a moment and say thank you to all
Speaker 1: our dedicated listeners. We've had the privilege of telling some
Speaker 1: very special stories this year, from a doctor turned rare
Speaker 1: disease patient and cutting edge cancer care to every story
Speaker 1: of determination this season. It's been so heartwarming seeing your
Speaker 1: reactions and humbling being able to share your stories. So
Speaker 1: if you have a medical mystery, don't hesitate to reach
Speaker 1: out to us. It's Symptomatic at iHeartMedia dot com and now,
Speaker 1: for the first time, you can also leave us a
Speaker 1: voicemail by using the link at the end of the
Speaker 1: show notes who knows you or someone you know could
Speaker 1: be at the center of the next episode or spark
Speaker 1: thoughtful conversation in an upcoming house calls. Until next time,
Speaker 1: be Well. Symptomatic is a production of Ruby Studio from iHeartMedia.
Speaker 1: Our show is hosted by me Lauren breg Pacheco. Executive
Speaker 1: producers are Matt Rema and myself. Our EP of Post
Speaker 1: production is James Foster. Our supervising producer is Cierra Kaiser.
Speaker 1: Our writers are John Irwin and Diana Davis, and our
Speaker 1: editor is Sierra Spreen, with additional help from Matt Stillo.