The Bulletin Newspapers.com

Accident leads to a new life for HP man:
Dana Forsythe 12.JUN.08

Dan Cummings is beyond determined.

Cummings, who was once told by doctors that he’d never walk again after a swimming accident left him paralyzed, has since regained the strength and ability. Now he’s looking to give others hope.

As a client and business manager, Cummings recently helped open Journey Forward, an intense exercise driven rehabilitation center for spinal cord injury (SCI). And, just last year, he was able to throw out the first pitch at a Red Sox game.

"Before my accident I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do," he said. "Maybe, be an actor. When I broke my neck, I hit rock bottom. But I made a promise to dedicate my life to getting out of the wheelchair. I’ve done it and I see that there aren’t enough of these centers out there. Living in Boston, one of the best cities for medicine, there wasn’t a place that could help me."

"Now I know what I want to do in my life," Cummings said. "[I want to] help continue to open these centers."

In the summer of 2000, Cummings, a Hyde Park native, was 19-year-old college student at the Mass Bay College.

When an accident left him paralyzed from the chest down, he was admitted into intensive care where it was revealed that his left lung had also collapsed.

"Doctors just told me to take it one day at a time," Cummings said. "They also said I’d probably never walk again."

Hooked up to ventilator, it was weeks before Cummings could breathe on his own.

"I just refused to believe that this was it," he said.

When Cummings was able to move around, he began his physical therapy, spending 45 minutes, three days a week.

"I did that for three years, but I didn’t feel like I was making much progress," Cummings said. "That’s all insurance would pay for though."

That’s when things changed for Cummings, and when he found out about Project Walk, a San Diego based program dedicated to improving the lives of those who have sustained paralysis from a spinal cord injury.

Project Walk, Cummings said, offered an unparallel level of rehabilitation training where he could train for three hours a day.

"The biggest problem was that it was in California and I was in Boston," he said. "I didn’t want to have someone to move out there with me, so I spend the next 11 months becoming independent enough to move out there."

Within that time frame, Cummings forced himself to learn to drive again and became independent enough to move around by himself.

Luckily, he also had a brother living in Los Angeles to assist him as he needed it.

The move paid off.

"Four years at that place and I walked out," Cummings said.

Since then Cummings has been busy helping to bring the same care and physical therapy to the Boston area. At the start of the year, Project Walk opened the doors of its New England regional spinal cord injury recovery center located in Canton. Named Journey Forward, the program underscores the intensity and commitment need to carry out post-injury rehabilitation.

John Walters, the program director, spent the last five years learning and perfecting The Dardzinski Method, an intensive exercise-based recovery program for SCI was developed by Project Walk founders Ted and Tammy Dardzinksi. Using the Dardzinski Method, the program attempts to re-educate the damaged nervous system through appropriate physical stimulation.

Cummings is now six years post injury and continues to improve. As business manager, he oversees the day-to-day operations and also helps train new specialists from the point of view of a person who has suffered a spinal cord injury, providing the specialists with a different perspective of how to work with an SCI.

"The goal with this center was to transfer it into the community," Dardzinksi said. "Dan was really the trigger for this to happen." Additionally, Dardzinksi said, Cummings even has an award "named" after him.

"It’s called the Rudy Award, for the hardest working client," he said. "Dan just came in and worked hard everyday." Cummings won the award in 2005 and 2006 and came back last year to present.

Although Journey Forward opened their doors earlier in the year, Cummings said, their grand opening will kick off with a June 15 fundraiser at Moseley’s on the Charles. "We opened up with 25 clients and five trainers," he said. "And we’ll be hiring three more in July."

Journey Forward is located at 55 Dedham Street Canton, MA 02021. For more information, call (781) 821-WALK. For more information on the fundraiser, call (866) 680-5636.