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Two weeks left in Atlanta

 Jackson is in Atlanta, two weeks out from finishing Beyond Therapy at Shepherd Center. He wraps up October 22. In his words: "Have a great day everyone! I have 2 more weeks of therapy at Shepherd Center until October 22nd." Coming back here is a strange thing to be glad about. The last time he arrived at Shepherd he came by critical care flight and could not breathe on his own. This time he walked in to do the work. Beyond Therapy is the program for after the hospital part is over. It's about strength and independence, the things that decide whether he can go off to college in 2027 and manage on his own. That is what these weeks are for. Thank you to everyone still checking in on him. It matters more than you know.
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True Grit, and then back to Atlanta

 Graduation was the goal for a year. Now the goal is college, and that means a different kind of work. In July Jackson went to Rutgers University for their True Grit program, which exists for exactly this: young people with spinal cord injuries learning how to run their own lives again before they head off to school. Not therapy in the hospital sense. The ordinary things that stop being ordinary after an injury like his. From there he headed back to Atlanta. Shepherd Center took him in as a patient in February 2025 when nobody could tell us what his life was going to look like. This time he went back on purpose, for their Beyond Therapy program, to keep building strength and independence. The plan is college in 2027. He is working on being able to do it on his own.
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He walked across the stage

Sixteen months ago, doctors in Vancouver told us Jackson had a complete spinal cord injury and that he would likely never move below his neck again. On Friday he stood up and walked across the stage to get his diploma. He got there on arm crutches. A year ago it was a platform walker, then a smaller one, then crutches, with months of physical therapy at Courage Kenny in Golden Valley and the family driving back and forth several times a week to get him there. What he said beforehand was this: "Not the whole school has seen me walk." Now they have. Thank you to everyone who has prayed for him, written to him, and shown up for this family. Jackson is not done. Neither are we.
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