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Once paralyzed, North Texas man fueled by faith finishes half Ironman

In 2011, Trent Fielder was diagnosed with chronic Guillain Barre syndrome, which causes massive nerve degeneration.

Swimming laps in the far lane of a Burleson pool is where Trent Fielder feels his best.

“The peaceful calm that comes from it,” Fielder said about swimming. “It’s a weightlessness that’s comforting.”

It wasn’t long ago that swimming, exercising, even moving, weren’t options for the father of two.

“When the first doctor said, ‘have you ever heard of Guillain Barre,’ I wasn’t trying to be sarcastic, I asked him if that was another doctor in the hospital,” he said.

In 2011, he was diagnosed with chronic Guillain Barre syndrome, which causes massive nerve degeneration. At one point, Fielder was paralyzed from the neck down. “Every dream that I saw as possible before had now gone away,” Fielder said.

But years into his illness, his daughter said a prayer that he feels turned things around. “She said, ‘Dear God, in this new year I want my daddy to feel better. I want my daddy to walk again,'" he said.

Days later, he started working with physical therapist Amy Gonzalez at Texas Health Burleson. “He basically had no active muscle use in his legs at all,” she said.

When Gonzalez got Fielder into the pool, he was able to move his legs for the first time in years. As he grew stronger, so did his goals.

“He approached me in June of this year,” said Arlene White, who runs the cardiac rehab department at Texas Health Burleson and is also a triathlon coach, “and told me his aspirations and dreams of doing a half Ironman, 70.3 miles.”

Any skepticism was quickly erased, as White watched Fielder vigorously and faithfully train for a race that most able-bodied people can’t do. He used a racing wheelchair and a hand cycle. “His personal goal was to cross that finish line by walking,” White said.

And that is exactly what he did. Cell phone video shows the emotional moment he crossed the finish line. “I continued to pray and think about the people I cared about and I kept going,” Fielder said, mentioning the veteran support organization, 22 Kill, as a main source of his motivation.

“Anything is possible. And Trent proved that in so many ways,” White said.

He humbly credits it all to his faith. “There’s nothing special or different about me,” he said. “I just took my spirit and unleashed it.”

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