Positivity: Wounded Mail Carrier Takes Steps
Saturday, May. 10 2008
Chesterfield — Church bells tolled in the distance as an unintentional but perhaps fitting signal just before Terry Marcrum climbed out of a wheelchair Friday and took slow, deliberate steps back toward his old life.
Some say his walking, his very survival, is a miracle.
Staff at St. John’s Mercy Rehabilitation Hospital in Chesterfield offered hugs, and fellow patients wiped away tears, as they said good-bye to Marcrum, a mail carrier who survived a gunshot to the head and became an inspiration for them.
Returning home for a long recovery, Marcrum, 44, said he carries no anger toward the stranger who shot him with no explanation April 14 on his postal route in St. Louis.
“I thank God I’m alive everyday,” Marcrum said. “It was like I was given a second chance at life.”
He already has been putting that second chance to good use.
In 2½ weeks at the rehab center, he encouraged other patients to push against obstacles, and impressed his doctors and physical therapists.
“He makes so many people feel good,” said David Poertner, 24, of Valley Park, who came to the rehabilitation center depressed that back problems might cost him the ability to walk. “I really felt like my life was over. The doctors told me I was paralyzed. Terry told me I wasn’t. He believed in me.”
Marcrum, 44, talked to reporters Friday with slow, broken speech. On instructions from prosecutors, he avoided discussing the shooting. He focused instead on his recovery, and gratitude.
“I just wanted to thank everybody for the support they have given me,” he said. “Their prayers and well wishes — it’s been overwhelming.”
Marcrum said that since moving from a hospital to rehab on April 22, he had to learn to speak again and to regain his balance. He said his goal is to encourage others through similar struggles.
He recalled joking one day with a fellow patient who was so self-conscious about a speech problem that she would avoid talking to anyone. “I asked her if I smelled or something,” Marcrum remembered. “Ever since, I couldn’t get her to shut up.”
THE BEST MAN
Another goal, achieved, was to be released in time to be best man at his brother Tony’s wedding today in St. Louis County.
“He’s always kind of been sunny-side up,” said another brother, Jerry Marcrum. “To see him here today is a miracle. I told him God is on his side.”
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