You, me, or nobody is gonna hit as hard as life. But it ain’t about how hard you hit. It’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward; how much you can take and keep moving forward.
That’s how winning is done!
Rocky Balboa

“Yeah – My old man, who was never the sharpest, told me I weren’t born with much brain, so I better use my body”, Rocky tells Adrianna when he takes her iceskating on Thanksgiving.

When I ran up the famous steps to the Philadelphia Museum of Arts on a frosty, sunny early morning this week, I felt like not even having much use of my body, so exhausted I was when I got there.

My few days in the Land of the Free though were primarily about exploring how we could collaborate with the amazing people researching, teaching, and practicing in brain injury who had come to visit us in Dublin previously to build the world’s leading centre for those with a severe Acquired Brain Injury. Thomas Jefferson University and the MossRehab Centre in Philadelphia are leading the field in the United States. The few days we spent together with faculty were incredibly inspiring and motivating. In addition to our US partners, there were also colleagues from UCD, the Technical University of Dublin, and Ulster University who are all very much behind our new joint research and teaching centre.

I took a seven hour Amtrak train journey from Philadelphia via New York to Boston, where I arrived to have another meeting, this time with the eminent Joe Giacino’s Spaulding Rehab/Harvard Medicine research group to learn about their work and to discuss how it could contribute to help those who are not yet on anybody’s radar because they are still considered to be ‘lost cases’ – when they are beautiful human beings.

Boston Spaulding / Harvard Rehabilitation Hospital

Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital is one of the premier research and rehabilitation hospitals in the USA. They were incredibly accommodating and supportive making time for a visit and detailed exchange, even on a Saturday.

The Hospital is very old but its current building was opened in 2013.

Cape Cod

The last leg of this trip is to Cape Cod. I was nervous about going there, especially on my own. Last night, I jogged from the Hyannis Inn to the hospital. Today, II will meet with a good friend who has accompanied us from afar for many years. I hope not to drown in memories but to take back more strength and determination to change the world, even a little.

If you were there 13 years ago, you will recognise the cafeteria, the visitors’ waiting room, the doors to the ICU, the chapel, and, of course, the hospital building itself. The smell was still the same, the noises had not changed, only that it was virtually empty. The time I remember here was busy, we never left, there were sometimes dozens of people around, waiting, helping, getting coffees non-stop and there was – the organ donation team waiting for us in the cafeteria. They never met us.

This is for Pádraig who has been showing me every day that it ain’t about how hard you hit. It’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward; how much you can take and keep moving forward.
That’s how winning is done!