I found a real life hero! Sometime back, I recently wrote an article titled Are You A Hero? The link to that article is below.

http://www.authorsden.com/visit/viewarticle.asp?id=19928

There is a gentleman, Ronald Hull (http://www.authorsden.com/visit/author.asp?authorID=3918) who over a period of time has written several reviews of my work. At the end of one of his reviews he told me a little of his story. This is part of what he wrote:

Thanks, but I don't, "struggle with my illnesses." I have been paralyzed for 57 years and the paralysis primarily affects muscle control. I am actually quite healthy and don't have the usual illnesses associated with aging. I do have occasional urinary tract infections caused by the use of an external catheter restricting urine flow and potential blood clots caused by inactivity since I have been quadriplegic for the last 27 years. I had no trouble with that when I walked with shriveled hands and arms. 

My blood data is normal and I'm not taking any pills except for spasms and a blood thinner for blood clots. My heart and artery system, lungs and other organs are free from the usual diseases lifestyles get people in. By lung capacity by my diaphragm muscle gradually losing its ability is now probably one fifth of what it was when I was first paralyzed and could swim underwater for two minutes without surfacing.

I did have a cold in mid-December that lasted a month. Otherwise, I have been free from illnesses of any kind for over the last three years.

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I immediately remembered the article above and forwarded it to him. Here is his response to the story:

Mel, Thanks for the whole article. But all I needed was the title or a link to it. Very interesting. At that time I was working and didn't read many of the articles, so I probably missed this one. But it is very familiar. After a scare with a pneumonia that almost killed me in 2012, I hurried up and finished my autobiography in 2014, Hanging by a Thread. It contains many of the elements you describe on what it takes to be a hero.

 I have never been too interested in psychology, but as a human factors engineer, certainly had some enlightening courses on the subject, particularly at Stanford during my master's degree. I was taking a very "safe" route in college and getting top grades when I began to question my career path and by sophomore year just before becoming paralyzed in surgery. 

And then, spending nine months at home at 21 after leaving home at 18, confident being on my own with my twin brother tagging along. But the support I had at home with probably my first mentor, my mother, was what made me feel confident being on my own. 

Acquiring a hand split allowing me to write again (that I'm still using today, 56 years later) and going back to college with help from an experimental federal rehab program in our county, was all I needed to return to almost normal life again. Although I continued to be very active on campus and got straight As in my coursework, I was shocked by the loss of so-called, friends, who were just fair weather acquaintances. 

Fortunately, I had many mentors along the way that helped me shape my future. I am forever grateful to them and tried to be a mentor to others throughout my career. I have not always made the best decisions for my career, but have been lucky when unlucky things came along to have weathered them quite well. Am I a hero?

 I guess so according to your article. I always feel good when my former students talk very kindly of me. I never had a teacher that I didn't learn something from. Even bad teachers taught me how not to teach and bad managers taught me how not to lead.

Are you familiar with Andy Barkan's campaign, Be a Hero? Quite a resourceful guy with ALS. https://www.msnbc.com/ali-velshi/watch/ady-barkan-launches-new-campaign-asking-everyone-to-be-a-hero-1214887491665 Keep up the good work. I can't wait to complete my two books I'm working on. You can follow them, chapter by chapter, as I post them on AD. http://www.authorsden.com/visit/author.asp?authorID=3918 They are slow in developing, because I'm only devoting about an hour or two every day to writing. Spending a lot of time writing like this to some of my many followers here. Cordially, Ron 

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In my view, Ron is a hero

If you want to read the article, Are You A Hero?, the link is above. I also recommend seeing the movie, Hero, staring Dustin Hoffmam, Andy García and Geena Davis. The point of all of this is that as the movie suggests, we are all heroes.