Maryland Rehab Center

By |Published On: February 21, 2018|Categories: 4-Minute Radio Program|

Hi, I’m Joni Eareckson Tada with a story that made my eyes wet.

A few weeks ago, I received an email from Vicky, an administrator who works at the Maryland Rehab Center which is part of the National Rehab Network that covers Maryland, and DC and Virginia. Well Vicky, his administrator wrote, saying, “Dear Joni: I work for the National Rehab Hospital in Baltimore. When I started rehab years ago you were newly injured, and had just finished rehabilitation. I followed your story back then, and I still do. We are building a new facility and are looking for quotations to put on the walls. And I would be so honored to have something from you that would encourage and give direction to our patients as they go through their course of rehabilitation. Our rehab center has departments for spinal cord injuries, stroke, cancer and other debilitating conditions. We are very excited about this new addition to our facility. I will even take more than one quotation as I have so much admiration for you. Thank you, signed Vicky.”

I had to re-read that email, because I wasn’t certain I heard it right. I mean when I was injured back in 1967, the Maryland Rehabilitation Center was called Montebello State Hospital. Well over fifty years ago, it only had a fledgling rehab department for people with spinal cord injuries, and back then, I was only one of, I don’t know, about seven or eight young people who were paralyzed from accidents. For the full year that I remained at Montebello, I stayed on a geriatric ward. To say the least, it was pretty depressing. The institution was old and in much need of upgrading. Nevertheless, I learned how to feed myself at that rehab center. And the doctors there set me on a course of self-managing my disability, and to this day, I am still following their recommended routines to keep me healthy. It may have been a sad depressing place back then, but I owe Montebello a lot.

Over the years, it upgraded and morphed and became part of the National Rehab Network. The facility is now very modernized, and its departments serve people of all ages with various disabling conditions. The Maryland Rehab Center is a far cry from that old state institution in which I was housed for well over a year. And this is why Vicky’s email touched me so. Because there are countless young people – quadriplegics like me – who I know will be wheeling the hallways of that new addition. And to think that I have a chance to inspire them with a quotation or two painted on the walls? Wow! Never would I have dreamed, never would I have imagined. So what are a few of the quotes I sent her?

Well, “Suffering provides the gym equipment on which faith can be exercised.” How ‘bout that? And I also sent her this one, I said: “Deny your weakness, and you will never realize God’s strength in you.” I love that one. And then I said, “Suffering is the textbook that will teach you who you really are, not who you think you are.” And then I sent this quote: “God is more concerned with building perseverance in your life, than leaving you in your comfort zones.” And the last one, “The greatest good suffering can do for me is to stretch my capacity for God.” And then one more, “Your future is bright. Hope is written all over your horizon.”

I don’t know which of those quotes they’re gonna to use, but whatever they use, I’ll be so honored! Hey if you’d like those quotes that I just shared, then stop by my radio page today at joniandfriends.org where I’ve posted them all for you to download and while you’re on my radio page, don’t forget to pick up your free gift on God’s guidance. God bless you and remember, “Suffering provides the gym equipment on which faith can be exercised.”

© Joni and Friends

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