Spinal cord injury won’t stop Crafton man from living

Published: Wednesday, December 26, 2012, 8:57p.m. Updated: Wednesday, December 26, 2012

Paul Hickling remembers the moment a neurologist told him he wouldnt be able to walk or use his arms again.

I threw him out of the room, said Hickling, 55, of Crafton. I said, how dare you tell somebody that, that theyre never going to walk again! Because at that point, I could have just decided Im just going to lay in bed the rest of my life.

That didnt happen.

Hickling, who suffered a spinal cord injury in April 2010 and spent the next several months in various hospitals and treatment facilities, eventually regained that all-important ability.

While Hickling still cant feel temperature or pain from his chest down, he has the ability to walk and has limited use of his arms and hands. He still is classified as a quadriplegic because he doesnt have full use of all his limbs, but thats a far cry from what could have been.

Hicklings injury is between the C6 and C7 levels of his spinal cord. Injuries at that level of the spinal cord typically affect hands, wrists and arms but also can affect trunk and leg use.

Every doctor Ive talked to says hes an anomaly, said his mother, Dolores Hickling, 79. The injury he has is usually associated with a gunshot wound to the spine or a knife to the spine . . . some traumatic injury to the spine. But he was simply sitting on the couch, watching TV.

The injury occurred on April 25, 2010, when Hickling was at his home in Crafton. While putting items back into his freezer after defrosting it, Hickling felt a little tingle in the back of his neck.

I didnt know what it was, he said. I thought I pulled something, moving the wrong way or whatever.

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Spinal cord injury won’t stop Crafton man from living