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Can | Dick Hoyt | Worlds Strongest Dad in The World
By Viola | November 26, 2007
Can | Dick Hoyt | Worlds Strongest Dad in The World
Isn’t it that every year around this time, the media is flooded with articles and stories about gratitude. And of course, it makes us all “feel good” for a few days before we move on to complaining. We forget to respect and honour what is right in our lives, NO matter how small… each day.
Gratitude is not an issue for Dick and Rick Hoyt. They are a father and son team who have competed in over than nine hundred road races, marathons, triathlons and other athletic endeavours. Dick is in his late 60s and Rick, his son is in his 40s and he has been wheelchair bound without the ability to speak since birth. Together they are a team and have been an inspiration for thousands of people. One of the most touching videos I’ve seen.
Eighty-five times Dick pushed his disabled son, Rick, 26.2 miles in marathons. Eight times he’s not only pushed him 26.2 miles in a wheelchair, but also towed him 2.4 miles in a dinghy while swimming, and pedalled him 112 miles in a seat on the handlebars and that ALL IN THE SAME DAY!!!!
Rick Rielly recently wrote in Sports Illustrated:
This love story began in Winchester , Mass. , 43 years ago, when Rick was strangled by the umbilical cord during birth, leaving him brain-damaged and unable to control his limbs.
“He’ll be a vegetable the rest of his life;” Dick says doctors told him And his wife, Judy, when Rick was nine months old. “Put him in an Institution.”
But the Hoyts weren’t buying it. They noticed the way Rick’s eyes followed them around the room. When Rick was 11 they took him to the engineering department at Tufts University and asked if there was anything to help the boy communicate. “No way,” Dick says he was told. “There’s nothing going on in his brain.”
“Tell him a joke,” Dick countered. They did. Rick laughed. Turns out a lot was going on in his brain. Rigged up with a computer that allowed him to control the cursor by touching a switch with the side of his head, Rick was finally able to communicate. First words? “Go Bruins!” And after a high school classmate was paralyzed in an accident and the school organized a charity run for him, Rick pecked out, “Dad, I want to do that.”
Yeah, right. How was Dick, a self-described “porker” who never ran more than a mile at a time, going to push his son five miles? Still, he tried. “Then it was me who was handicapped,” Dick says. “I was sore for two weeks.”
That day changed Rick’s life. “Dad,” he typed, “when we were running, It felt like I wasn’t disabled anymore!”
I suggest to watch the video… then watch it again… and again… move beyond talking about being grateful once a year. Start to live Gratitude!
At the time of my posting the video had 7,424,888 viewings on youTube.
Topics: Love |
