One week. That is all the time that stood between Brayden Harless and the graduation ceremony he had spent 13 years working toward. Then, on May 8, the Iowa high school senior dozed off behind the wheel on his way home, and his car nose-dived straight into a ditch. By the time first responders reached him, his life had been turned completely upside down.
Harless fractured two vertebrae in the crash, his L1 and T12, leaving him paralyzed from the waist down. He spent more than a week in the intensive care unit at MercyOne hospital in Des Moines, facing a reality no 18-year-old should ever have to confront: the possibility that he may never walk on his own again.
What makes this story even more remarkable is what happened in those quiet, terrifying minutes after the crash, before anyone found him. Harless was alone in a ditch, injured, and had to summon every ounce of strength to drag himself to his phone and call 911. He has said he credits something bigger than himself for that decision, describing a moment where he heard a voice telling him he needed to make that call or risk losing the ability to walk at all…