by Gabriel Anspaugh

Published: Lifelines for Health Fall 2018

I was diagnosed with inhibitors when I was 15 years old. Up until that point I lived my life pretty normally. Yes, I had hemophilia, but I wasn’t going to let it get in the way of how I lived my life. However, the first little bit of time with inhibitors was quite tough on my mental state. What could I do, and what couldn’t I do? And could I even get back to where I was? As time went on, I again discovered what I could do and what would be more difficult for me.

Back in February, I was on a slackline at a rock-climbing gym. (I know, a hemophiliac with an inhibitor at a rock-climbing gym - sounds like the beginning of a bad joke, right?) Moving on, a slackline is essentially a tightrope that has a lot of slack, so it’s more wobbly. I was determined to prove that I could do this. I ended up rolling my ankle pretty severely. This injury put me in the hospital for a week and in a wheelchair for many more. As I was going through this, it was pretty hard for me to look at the positive side of this situation since there really wasn’t one when losing the ability to walk.

However, there was an upside to this accident. Eight months later, this life lesson came full circle when I attended an educational, adventure, camp program for individuals with inhibitors called Leverage in Oregon. As I was at Leverage, one activity we did was a high ropes course. The amazing instructors had suggested to us that we each find a specific goal to accomplish. I wanted to complete every element of that course.

My first instinct was to go straight for the most difficult ones to complete. In my nature of being a very physically, active person, these tasks were fairly easy for me. But I knew that the last element was going to be a challenge. It was a slackline with ropes hanging

at separate points to hold onto. My experience with a slackline from less than a year prior was the most difficult for me to accomplish. It’s funny how such an easy obstacle to complete was the most difficult for me to overcome. That horrible fall, the time spent in the hospital, and that debilitating wheelchair were all running through my mind throughout the entire experience. I watched all of my blood brothers (who I had grown to know and love) go through this obstacle with

no problem and just keep going. However, when I stepped out and was about a quarter of the way through this element, I actually had to stop, take a knee, breath, and wrap my mind around everything. I knew I couldn’t fall because I had a safety line. And I knew that the likelihood of injury was low. But why was this so hard for me? Once I caught my breath enough to keep going, I just had to keep my eyes on the trees ahead and try not to focus on the memories of what was the worst injury of my life. Once I got to the next platform, I had to fight off tears as I realized that I just conquered something that had crippled me for a better part of the year.

So, what was one of the biggest things that I took away from Leverage 2018? ...the memory of conquering something that was once so disabling to me.