As it states in my bulleted version of my AutoBio, I was born 2 August 1973 at 2:45 PM PDT in North Bend Coos County Oregon to Carl Dennis and Kathryn Ann Griffith. I was the first born of twin girls, my sister being named Susan Marie and who was born five minutes after me. The funny thing is, I was born breach, she was not; however, she was the one who suffered some breathing difficulties immediately following her delivery. We also could not leave the hospital before both of us were named; my parents had one girls name picked out, and two boys names, go figure *grimmace*. Now, my dad is somewhat of a wise man, and quite sensitive, as he somehow knew and attempted to inform my mom that she was pregnant and having twin girls before she had even missed her cycle. Quite the guy my dad; right?!? Well they went along through several to many doctors visits in which it was told to my mom that she was simply having just one big boy, and since they didn’t have Ultrasound technology in the early 70’s, that wasn’t a tool at their disposal to determine correctness in this area either, darn it. So, with being a newly expecting mother-to-be, and a father who wasn’t to be believed, because, what does a man really know about being pregnant, right, they went their merry ways making preparations for the single birth that most were expecting. Little did they know that when the time came, they would need two of everything, including names, and feminine ones at that!

So, time drew near for my sister and I to make our appearance and generally, twins aren’t on time, they are usually early. Not us, we were right on time! We were actually born right on our due date; which by most standards is unusual for twins; however, we were still considered premature because of our birth weights. I was 5lbs. 8 oz. and Susan was 5lbs. and 9.5 oz.; I don’t know how long we were however, I don’t have easy access to that information. All I know is that we were tiny. So, not only did we had to stay in the hospital to gain in size, but they were still coming up with a second name for my sister. For a short time, we were know as “Baby A” and “Baby B” Griffith.

As I understand it, my dad danced my maternal Grandmother around the hallway, as there wasn’t any space in the birthing room for all of the doctors and attendants and him also…for they had to have basically two of everything in the room, since there were two of us *giggle*. And I just know all of you are asking, “So, was it a natural birth, or what?!”. Yes, it was, however, my mom did basically pass out and had to be re-awakened for the second delivery, and it was at this point that the doctors finally knew for a certainty that there were indeed two babies! The exclamation to my mom was, “Mrs. Griffith, wake up, there’s another one coming!!”

Thus, my sister and I had then made our way into the world, and caused our own form of hoopla as well! Of course that came in handy later on as both my sister and I enjoyed the dramatic arts in High School, but that is for another time. Back to the early years; one must remain focused to tell this right.

So, now; fast forward to about age–oh, say about 2 years and around 9 mos. of age. My dad is preparing to ship out to the Bahamas, to the Island of San Salvador for his next isolated duty station as an Electronic Technician in the U.S. Coast Guard. He was due to be stationed at a Loran Station there, which stands for Long Range Station; which had to do with radio waves and communication towers for long range communication. At this time, he was still standing on his own two feet. Soon after settling in and tending to his duties, he was on a moral outing with the rest of the station staff and a sandstone cliff he was peering over to find the rest of his crew gave way under his weight. He attempted to dive, but to no avail, he descended until he made contact head first into the surf on the shelf of the island. He was then drug across fire coral. The first part broke his neck at a level just below his clavicle between his Cervical and Thoracic regions of his spinal cord; the “T12-C1″ vertebra were the ones that were broken, which caused him to from then on be paralyzed. Technically, he is considered a quadriplegic because of the level and what abilities he has, but, since he has the use of his hands and a certain amount of mobility and limited stability of his trunk, he is categorized as a paraplegic. He has been in a wheelchair since April 6, 1976, which means he just had his 32nd anniversary of his accident this past Sunday. During his ordeal, and before his rescue happened, he had also been drug across fire coral as stated before, what that does is temporarily paralyzes you because of the chemicals in the coral. However, he was still miraculously still able to get himself pulled back to the outer shore of the beach so that those he was with could see him. This apparently went on for about 20 minutes.

So he was finally rescued, and taken to Jackson Memorial Hospital in Dade Cty. Miami. Here, he underwent several surgeries to repair what they could of his broken neck and spine. As Spinal Cord Injury Medicine was still in it’s infancy, there wasn’t a lot they could do at that time still. However, my dad’s courage and resolve to not give up prevailed, as he went through his therapy sessions for rehabilitation, which only took about 3/4’s the time that normal spinal cord injury patients take!

Soon before he knew it; it was time to go home, to Washington State, where they had relocated to be near the one and only Spinal Cord Injury Medical center on the west side of the Mississippi River…and family who was also living in WA at the time.

These are my earliest memories before the age of four. I will continue with more later, thanks for reading.