Doctor Tells Paralyzed Biker He Will Not Even be Able to Walk Again, So Biker Proves Him Wrong and Continues to Ride

Just last year, 21-year-old dirt bike rider Mark Frahn was riding his 450cc dirt bike when he misjudged a jump, landed on the front tire and tumbled. The motorcycle landed on his back and fractured his vertebrae, and then he couldn’t feel below his knees.

(All images taken from York Daily Record)

 

When the York County man woke up, the doctors told him he would never be able to walk again.

“It seems like everything that I was working for just stopped, and it was my fault because I wanted to go out and ride a dirt bike, I wanted to race,” Frahn told the York Daily Record.

According to their local news, Frahn had grown up riding motorbikes. His first bike was a “little” XR 50, before he moved on to a JR 80, then a racing bike, the CR 80 Expert. As he grew up, his motorbikes also “grew” with him - they had better performance to suit Frahn who started racing competitively in 2017.

Frahn even said that riding was the only time he could stop worrying about his other burdens. “It’s the only time I feel myself,” he said.

But with the accident on June 11th, everyone told him he wouldn’t be able to “feel” again.

 

The biker didn’t give up, though. Throughout his hospital stay, he watched dirt bike videos, as well as a Facebook video showing someone with a spinal cord injury continuing to ride motocross.

Although medical staff were worried that Frahn would get some form of PTSD if he was around dirt bikes, the man was still determined to hop onto a motorbike again. He told the doctor to give him a year, and he would not only be walking, but riding again.

And ride again he did.

In the weeks following the accident the biker started intense physical therapy so that he will be able to use his legs again. His goal to become a veterinary technician as his future career, as well his best friend Caitlyn, motivated him further to ride again.

“I wasn’t about to watch her grow up riding dirt bikes and loving that life and me sitting there teaching her,” Frahn said about Caitlyn. “I want to actually be able to ride with her.”

 

With sheer determination and pure passion, Frahn finally managed to get back onto his feet less than a year later.

Of course, he also had some misgivings. “I had that thought before: What if I get hurt again? What if the injury is even worse and what if I lose all function? I’ve always been taught not to be scared of falling, always to get up,” he said.

 

His parents were worried about him riding again too, but mother Norma Frahn also said that it was, after all, what made her son happy. Frahn’s father Bill also said that the thought of his son getting back on the machine that fractured his spine “scared the hell out of [him]”, but in the end was also supportive.

“I’ll be honest with him and I’ll say, ‘Son, I never want you to ride a bike again. But son, I can never ask it of you because it would break my heart more than it would yours.’ So I can’t wait to see him soar like an eagle again,” Bill stated.

 

And on May 11th, Frahn went back to the same patch of land where he had wrecked his dirt bike and injured himself.

With his legs strapped to the dirt bike and the support of his loved ones who were there to witness this incredible feat, Frahn took off.

 

“I’m back!” Mark Frahn yelled over the roar of the bike engine.

 

And he was.