After David Lawrence Jr. became paralyzed from the neck down, his father found an unlikely therapy to help him regain his motor function.
When devastation and trauma struck David Lawrence's perfectly healthy, happy family, the courageous father responded by making the impossible… possible.
At 11 years old, his son David Jr. underwent surgery on his brain stem to remove a life-threatening growth. After the procedure, the surgeons and doctors said that David Jr. would never walk again.
Seeing his son paralyzed from the neck down and facing life as a quadriplegic, David Sr. stayed by his son's side through months of intensive rehabilitation. Then as the devoted dad was researching different therapies, David Sr. came across Hyperbaric Oxygen treatment.
Since David Sr. has been a scuba diver for many years, this therapy sparked his interest-so he began taking David Jr. to a local swimming pool for a new kind of workout. Kitted out in dive gear, David Jr.'s progress was amazing.
The physical "workout" that David Sr. designed for his son helped to rewire his nervous system until-over time-it brought life back to his once-paralyzed body.
David Sr. consistently reminded his son that he could do it, encouraging him to push through the pain and exhaustion and keep his goal in focus. Fast forward 10 years and David Jr. is now getting his PhD at university; he walks, runs, and works as a scuba instructor for his father's business, The Scuba Gym in Clermont, Florida. After David Jr.'s mom, Kim, and his two younger sisters jumped on board, rehabilitation has become their family business.
This is the true and inspiring story that motivated me-Lyndi Leggett (above)-to bring the scuba therapy to Australia, as a scuba instructor and leadership trainer on the Central Coast of New South Wales.
The therapy techniques that David Lawrence developed over the last 10 years have served to help people with disabilities and special neurological needs to improve their muscle tone, reduce their pain and spasms, stand up and walk with a quad cane, and even progress to walking unassisted. Furthermore, scuba therapy improves lung function, lymphedema, and boosts the lymphatic system.
Our clients at The Scuba Gym in Australia have been able to seek employment, sometimes for the first time in their lives, rather than being dependent on disability services that can often be inadequate.
All it takes is the desire and commitment to work hard. So often we hear from our clients that their medical team had reached the limit of what traditional rehabilitation could offer them. It takes pioneers who think outside the box-or in our case, outside the wheelchair-to bring hope back to people who've been told that there is none.
We challenge and change the way healing and rehabilitation is approached and combine that innovative thinking with a passion for scuba diving-because in an anti-gravity environment, where the restrictions of land don't apply, we can achieve incredible things.
Water You Waiting For? Share The Story With Your Friends On Social Media…
After 24 years of being unable to see out of his right eye, James O'Brien's vision has finally been restored thanks to a pioneering new stem cell treatment.
The university researchers say it's unclear why fasting produces so many positive effects—but were surprised by some of the benefits they found from ADF.
Since the vaccine was shown to be safe and effective on naturally-occurring tumors in animals, the treatment is now being tested on human cancer patients.
In addition to discovering a groundbreaking way of treating common vertigo in 2013, Dr. Carol Foster now has a how-to guide on dealing with the condition.
More than seven million people in the U.S. suffer from vertigo. A couple years ago there was a breakthrough discovered that delivered a do-it-yourself way to treat the most common form of vertigo.
This first-of-its-kind study used people's tweets to track their moods after visiting public parks—and they found that trees make us as happy as Christmas.
The Indonesian teen girls have received praise around the world after presenting research last month on how the native Bajakah tree cured cancer in a rat.
Not only has Su Metcalfe's treatment succeeded in early trials, it involves zero drugs and no side effects—and it could begin human trials as soon as 2020.
Be the first to comment