Doctors Said He’d Never Run Again; 20 Years Later, Turns Out They Were Right
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By the time Richard Wagner was 52 years old, the father of four and longtime runner had completed 28 marathons, at least 40 half-marathons, and, as he puts it, “more 5Ks than I can remember.” Then he suffered critical injuries in an auto accident, and doctors told him he would never run again.
Today, 20 years after that grim prognosis, it turns out those doctors were correct.
“I’ve got to hand it to them,” Wagner says. “They were spot on.”
“I mean, credit where it’s due, you know?”
“I mean, credit where it’s due, you know?”
At first, Wagner says, he remained hopeful and even defiant, determined to prove the doctors wrong. Almost immediately, he vowed to run a mile nonstop on his 53rd birthday, which at the time of his accident was about six months away.
“We runners, you know, we’re tough and we’re used to overcoming obstacles,” says Wagner. “So I told myself, You got this, Richard, and I circled my birthday on the calendar and got to work.”
For Wagner, that meant daily exercises and grueling, twice-weekly physical therapy sessions. It took him nearly three months to realize it was all pointless.
“I clearly wasn’t getting any closer to being able to run,” he says. “I’m an optimist to the end, but even I had to admit it just wasn’t going to happen.”
Wagner says he still misses running, but he’s found other ways to stay busy.
“I spend a lot of time gazing wistfully out the window,” he says. “Sometimes, I see runners pass by.”
