Page 20 - "Mississippi in the 1st Person" - Michael James Stone (Demo/Free)

THE MIRACLE of MICHAEL

“They said he couldn’t do it, so he did it”

Michael really is a genuine walking talking miracle mile kind of guy. Not only should he not
be alive, but he seemed to thrive on being told what he couldn’t do, until he did it.

Doctors warned him in his early twenties he wouldn’t live past 30 because of how severe and
uncontrollable his Crohns Disease was and working thru the Veterans Administrations Doc-

tors it was nearly a self-fulfilling prophecy as they could not solve Michaels issues.

They tried and nearly killed him trying , but while they meant well, they just didn’t know
how to help, but they kept trying.

Nearing 30, after being given a procto-ileo-collectomy , and attaching a “bag” on his side,

Ileostomy. One last surgery looked like his last and even Michael’s normal positive attitude
and faith sank in despair.

Yet he lived, barely.

He didn’t just live. He became active, vibrant, alive to life and challenging long held idea’s
of disability. Michael became one of the early fore runner of the those who took “disabled”
and enabled himself to overcome the stigma and the mind set to return to work several times

in many careers. Long before it was popular to ‘overcome’ Michael quietly overcame and
adapted to his “challenges” and never let them inhibit his desire to try and do anything.

While Michael could have and should have been a poster boy for many foundations to pay
for his trip down the Mississippi; or use the “funding gimmick” to raise money for others and
have your gear paid for,; Michael had decided long ago to connect with “the poor, the needy,

the lame”, perhaps because of his active faith. Perhaps to prove to himself it could be done
“in a rich mans sport”. Regardless the reason Michael holds himself to a personal inner core
dogma, one he heard long ago but saw so few of his contemporaries really do.

” Where God abides, God Provides”