“Physically, I’m OK,” she said recently. “But I still struggle with anxiety. Thinking can be like … scrambled eggs in my brain. I can get overwhelmed trying to process things.”
After being released and going home with Josh and Hall to Franklin, Tenn., Erica was convinced for three months that they were still living in Oxford, Miss., where she and Josh met in college.
An in-town visit with her dad made Erica pack for a four-hour drive and refuse to accept they were at his house minutes later. Once driving down Broadway in Nashville, seeing the old Ryman Auditorium made her remark how much Memphis was trying to look like Tennessee’s capital. About a half-dozen times, Josh had to call one of their favorite restaurants back in Oxford and cancel the order Erica had placed for pickup.
A reaffirmed faith
The couple each made a profession of faith as children. As big a test as the accident may have been, the years since have strengthened that faith.
“This injury has been the greatest gift I never asked for,” Erica said. “It’s helped me get my life back on track and showed me what’s important.”
It also got her more into Scripture while discovering a new hobby.
Erica had slept so much while healing at the hospital that, essentially, she and Hall were on the same schedule. She’d wake up at 4 a.m. and want something to do. Josh suggested she begin walking.
“I started walking a mile around the neighborhood. But soon, I got bored with that so I started running,” said Erica, who attends Rolling Hills Community Church in Franklin with her family. “I got bored with one mile, so I made it three.”
Although a three-sport athlete in high school – basketball, volleyball, switch-hitting shortstop in softball – Erica had never taken up running. But her passion for it grew over the miles. So did her playlist, which included the Bible.
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“All of this has helped me re-establish my faith. It’s become so real to me,” she said.
Her father-in-law, Bruce Baggett, knows this to be true as well.
“She is a miracle,” said Baggett, associate pastor at First Baptist Church in Monroe, Ga. “In conversations with Erica, I truly believe God spared her life for a reason. Not only is she a wife, a mom, a daughter and a sister, she has a new mission in life. I share her amazing story with everyone who will listen.
“Josh is the strongest man I know. I watched him navigate the most difficult situation that a husband could face. During her recovery, he patiently worked with her while not knowing what her recovery would look like. He did it by faith in God and because of his love for his wife and family.”
More work to do
Erica’s husband, of course, has had the best seat to watching her recovery.
“Sometimes I was so exhausted early on that I didn’t know what to think,” Josh said. “Then, I saw her progress and God working in her. It reaffirmed my faith and continues in seeing what she accomplishes.”
Erica, a social work major at Ole Miss, is a Community Relations manager for Rehab Without Walls, a national company that provides occupational, physical or speech therapy for those healing from neurological injuries or diagnoses like Parkinson’s Disease.
“I’m very passionate about this because I’ve lived it,” she said. “I want to give back to the next survivor and caregiver.
“God wasn’t ready for me to come home yet. There is more to do on this side of heaven.”
This article originally appeared at Baptist Press.
