[The following is an excerpt from the book.]

Man, Ryan, you’re not okay. That’s what I said to myself about two weeks in. I’d developed a urinary tract infection, and I had a fever. Even though the doctors had told me all about the spinal cord injury I’d suffered, even though they’d told me I only had a 20 percent chance of ever walking again, until now I’d assumed that I was going to get better.

When it first happened, when a routine tackle against the Bengals on the turf of Cincinnati’s Paul Brown Stadium left me with a burning sensation in my lower back and no feeling in my legs, my first thought had been, It’s a stinger—a nerve injury common in football that can temporarily send tingling, numbness, or loss of feeling, usually down the arm. No big deal. After the chopper ride from Cincinnati to Pittsburgh and surgery days later, I still had faith. I’d grown up in football and the church; I’d grown up following game plans. My new game plan was to figure out what I had to do in order to get better.

My faith had always been my not-so-secret weapon. When I was growing up in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, my dad, Vernon Shazier, was a preacher and my mom, Shawn, was a God-fearing, walking advertisement for the Golden Rule. They’re humble, loving, everyday folks. From them, I learned that God always has a plan for me. Mom used to tell me, “Whenever you’re in a tough situation, find a light in it.” In every situation, there’s always a way to focus on the good in it and not the bad—it’s just a matter of attitude. When I was five, my hair started falling out. I mean, in clumps. I was diagnosed with alopecia areata, an autoimmune disease that causes patchy hair loss. Imagine going to kindergarten bald. Kids can be less than tactful, and sometimes they’re downright mean. Mom’s take on it? “Ryan, God chose you to be bald,” she said.

Who was I to question His plan? It had been drummed into me: faith would set me free. But now, just two weeks after the play that would change my life, my faith was starting to crack.

Man, Ryan, you’re not okay, I kept telling myself. My cousin Nehari Crawford, who played football at Duquesne University, was seated by my hospital bed. Nehari had always looked up to me; I’d been his mentor. Now he was seeing me paralyzed from the waist down, feverish, sick to my stomach. I’d always been strong; strength, man, that was my thing. Now I was anything but. I felt the sickness rising in me and turned my head to throw up, but the vomit hit the rail on the side of my bed and some of it ricocheted back at me. You’re not okay, Ryan.

That’s when it started, the rush of “why me” thoughts. I’d always done the right thing: worked hard, treated people with respect and kindness. I’d been raised to believe that if you follow the rules, good things will happen. You get back what you put out there. And now.......this? Fourteen days ago, I’d been a world-class athlete; now here I was, vomit-covered, feverish, unable to take a step or raise a leg or feel anything below the waist.

Why, God?
Why me?
What did I do to deserve this?

* * *

In the years since my injury, you may have caught glimpses of me in a string of viral, feel-good moments. There I was, limping—but walking—onto the stage at the 2018 NFL Draft to loud applause before a packed, emotional auditorium. There I was, dancing at my wedding just seventeen months after the play that had left me paralyzed. Or you may have seen my return to Heinz Field on a football Sunday, waving the Terrible Towel to the cheering Steelers faithful from my wheelchair. Or you may have seen the giant “Get Well Soon, Ryan!” card in downtown Pittsburgh signed by fans from all over the world.

But those viral moments since December 4, 2017, don’t really tell the full story of these last four years. Because it hasn’t been all inspiration and smiles. Walking Miracle is the story of a comeback attempt—a comeback from paralysis, yes, but also a comeback from doubt. It’s also more than that. It’s really a story about the power of faith and the questioning of that faith; about the role positive thinking can play in healing; about the lessons for overcoming adversity found in a brutal game; about love, between a man and woman—I don’t know where I’d be without my wife, Michelle—but also love between a city and an athlete, and how, in a crazy way, one always seemed to inspire the other.

I’d always stared down odds. How many kids get alopecia at five years old? How many refuse to let it define them? How many kids are told in high school that they’ll never be able to play the game they love again because of a severe case of scoliosis? How many are able to play anyway, and not only play but dominate at every level? How many kids play Division I football, let alone go on to the NFL and rise to Pro Bowl heights?

Long odds? Don’t bring that talk here, I’d always thought. But you want a challenge? How about an 80 percent chance of living the rest of your life in a wheelchair?

This book is about what happens when things look so bleak you want to quit. How do you push through? It’s about how you go from doubt to realizing, Hey, maybe this is God’s plan. Maybe I’m going through just what I’m meant to go through. Maybe, more than any tackle or interception on the field, overcoming paralysis is what I’ve been put here to do, to inspire others. And it’s about changing your thinking so that you see the opportunity that lurks in tragedy. I was twenty-five years old, and I’d thought of myself as a football player for nearly my whole life. Wreaking havoc on the football field was not only what I did; it was also how I saw myself. Coming face-to-face with the possibility that I’d have to rethink how I self-identified was more of a challenge than lining up against the meanest, biggest SOBs on any given Sunday.

How you get there, though, how you shift your thinking and embrace the obstacle as the way to growth—that’s a little more complicated than the posting of a fun moment on Instagram might suggest.

That day in the hospital, when I vomited on myself? It unlocked a period of doubt and despair. Some moments, I’d feel depressed. You’re never getting better, I’d think. Other times, I’d feel anger.......at Him. My dad served You his whole life; he tended to Your flock faithfully. How could You do this to him?

But that day, in my fevered state, a hazy, fragmented memory started to come to me. It was from a lighter, more carefree time, a day during the 2016 season, the year before my injury. We were all in my Porsche Panamera: me; my best friend and trainer, Jerome Howard; my then girlfriend, Michelle; and my little brother, Vernon II. I was talking about how, even though I was going to the Pro Bowl, I still had a chip on my shoulder.

“I just want to make everybody believe in Shazier, man,” I said. “This is the year. The year everybody’s gonna believe in me.”

I was doing what great athletes do: they set goals and they tell themselves a story that helps them achieve them. My story was that no one believed in Shazier. I was going to make them believe.

“Believe in Shazier, I like that,” Michelle said.

“Shalieve!” Jerome barked out. “You gonna make them Shalieve!”

My eyes lit up. That was it—Ya gotta Shalieve! Something about the phrase struck me. I’d always believed in myself. But I also thought it was something for my teammates and the fans: I wanted them to believe that, on the field, I’d be their truest fighter. For the rest of the ride, we were calling it out. Every time we saw a passerby outside our window: “There’s a Shaliever!” We were laughing and high-fiving, energized by this fantasy of a city full of Shalievers.

Now, prone in a hospital bed, sick to my stomach, feverish, it came back to me, that image of all of us laughing, drunk on the power of belief. Through the haze, I knew. This wasn’t just some fever-induced memory. No, this was a sign. This was God telling me He had a purpose for me that I might not understand.

Could it be just a coincidence that at the very moment my faith was starting to fail me, a flashback to pure positivity jumped to mind? Was this God’s way of telling me what I needed right now? It was as if He was reminding me that though the stakes were higher than ever before, the prescription was the same. I needed to Shalieve, just like always.