A year ago today, I was wondering if I would ever walk again.

On February 1, 2012, my life changed. My dog, Roach, and I had just come home from a vet appointment. Roach, so excited to be home, was sprinting back and forth around the back yard, bursting with pent-up energy. I jumped into the grass to join him in a game of chasey-chasey, like we had done a hundred times. Roach juked the wrong way, I took a bad step, and he bashed into my knee at full speed with all my weight on it. I heard three loud pops, and collapsed to the ground.

At the hospital, they couldn’t believe my story. The ER doctor told me that this type of injury is usually sustained in car accidents, or acts of violence… not playing with a dog. They admitted me immediately and scheduled me for surgery. In which they used cadaver bone paste to re-build my crushed tibial plateau, and plates and screws to secure the 3 split fractures on my tibia. My torn ACL wasn’t even a priority for the surgeon. I didn’t leave the hospital for a week. The bill totaled over $122,000.00. Gulp.

For four months following the surgery, any weight (even a toe on the ground) risked permanent damage to my recovery. So for four months, I was basically bed ridden. I couldn’t walk or drive. I couldn’t prepare my own food, or carry a cup of coffee from the kitchen. At night, it was too risky to crutch myself to the bathroom in the dark, so I used a bedside urinal which, of course, I couldn’t empty myself. Talk about humbling.

During these long days and nights, alone in bed, I had no choice but to do some serious soul-searching. I battled my feelings of inadequacy as a dog-mommy. I used to take Roach for 5-mile runs around San Diego, and now I was wondering if I would ever even take my dog for a walk again. I felt helpless.

Possibly just to cheer me up, my brother proposed a business idea to me: “Doggie Joggie”. The dog walker market is pretty saturated in San Diego, but there seemed to be very few services who would run their clients’ dogs. At first, I was sad because I couldn’t imagine even being a dog walker, let alone a runner. But my brother told me to leave that to him. I did have a lot of time on my hands... So in bed with my laptop, I trademarked the name “Doggie Joggie”, incorporated our company in California, researched pet insurance, pet-CPR training, web design, internet marketing, branding, and how to accept payment. My to-do list filled up an 8’x4’ whiteboard and then some.

My brother and I have worked so hard to make this dream a reality. I handle branding, marketing and customer relations (the low-impact stuff), and my brother is our Lead Dog-Runner, Accountant, and Web Designer. We have faced unsure finances and battled crippling doubt. We have stayed up all night. We have learned how to code in HTML, how to write legal contracts, how to shop the competition in San Diego and beyond, and yes, even how to use twitter.

My knee will never be the same, and I probably will never run again. But after this year, all I feel is gratitude and pride. And that is how I turned the worst thing that ever happened to me into the best.

If you have turned tragedy into triumph, or have something inspiring to share, I’d love to hear your story. Feel free to comment below.