Last month, the New York Times published a thoughtful opinion piece by Dr. Daniela Lamas of Brigham and Women’s Hospital (“TV medical dramas are not like real life. Maybe they should be.”) in which the author suggested that medical television dramas today are not producing real life experiences. Her words struck a strong chord with our family.

Two years ago, my son, Sam, and his sweetheart, Laura, flew to Spain, where Sam had planned a romantic marriage proposal. A few days after the engagement, they hired a Spanish driver to take them to hike in El Caminito del Rey in Granada. On the way home, as the two tired lovers drifted off to sleep safely buckled up in the backseat, the driver grew distracted at the wheel and lost control of the car, flipping it at a high speed over the highway guardrail into a terrible, life-altering accident.

The driver and Sam suffered minor injuries, but Laura broke her C6 and C7 vertebrae. Laura underwent several spinal cord surgeries, first in Spain and then in New Jersey once she was stable enough to fly home in a medevac jet. She spent several months undergoing significant occupational and physical rehabilitation work as an in-patient at the Kessler Spinal Rehabilitation Center. In the fall of 2023, one year after the accident, Sam and Laura did marry in a small ceremony in the beautiful Frelinghuysen Arboretum in Whippany, New Jersey, but Laura did not get “to walk down the aisle.” As a quadriplegic, her life has not returned and will not return “to what it once was.”

And yet, Laura has adapted, developing a different, active life in a wheelchair. Over the past two years, she has connected with an expansive online disability community. She regularly shares her stories on Instagram about how she has learned to manipulate her special eating utensils, how she has grown proficient in applying her own eye makeup, and how she copes with opening heavy doors in public spaces.

This past summer, Laura joyfully tried out the new beach wheelchair purchased with an AARP grant by the town of Long Island, the Casco Bay island community where our family has spent over 30 summers. Laura has explored bowling and even played air hockey from a wheelchair. With grit and determination, this vibrant young woman has held lively Zoom discussions with curious children in Maine and California elementary and middle schools to talk about living with disability and finding resilience within.

Over the past year, Laura and another young quadriplegic woman she connected with online have developed an app page called “thetenpercentapp,” a social networking platform designed to support people living with disabilities and to help those of us able-bodied people become more aware.

Laura and Sam have had setbacks, such as trying to find the right health care coverage for all of her medical needs or being turned away from a reputable restaurant serving omakase in New York City that would not accommodate her inability to sit at a high-top table.

She continues to participate in demanding outpatient medical trials at Kessler Spinal Rehabilitation Center to try to strengthen her hand dexterity and to improve her upper body strength. And just yesterday, Sam drove Laura to an accessible voting site in their West Orange neighborhood of New Jersey, where election workers and Sam offered her assistance so she could vote early and in person in this important national election.

It is high time for medical TV dramas and Hollywood movies to show more realistic medical recoveries. The story of Sam and Laura can seem incredibly tragic. As one friend suggested to me early on, their accident was “a random act of unfairness in the universe.” And yet, the unfolding of their new life together has also become amazingly hopeful and filled with joy.