(Originally published August 21, 2025 on the National Seating and Mobility website).
Twenty-five years ago, NSM client Jerry Donovan made a promise—and he’s spent every day since keeping it.
Back then, Donovan worked for Boston Gas, fixing gas leaks throughout the city. In 1999, while driving his truck, his blood sugar suddenly dropped, causing a serious accident. The crash left Donovan—a Type 1 diabetic—with a T-6 spinal cord injury.
“In the ER, a priest came in, and I was an altar boy, so I knew why he was there,” Donovan recalls. “He was coming to give me my last rites. I made a promise to God: If you keep me alive, I promise I’ll do some good stuff.”
It’s a promise he’s been living out for the past quarter century, as Donovan says, “for people in my position, for people going through traumatic life changes, for people who recover and for the ones who don’t.”
“People need people,” he said. “We pick each other back up when all the cards are down.”
(To read the rest of the article on the National Seating and Mobility website, click here.)