I have been interested in spine surgery and spinal cord injury since Christopher Reeve was paralyzed in 1995, and I became a physician and a scientist because so many people take for granted the health and well-being that they possess, and which can so suddenly be stripped away. I was accepted into the Medical Scientist Training Program at The Ohio State University, where I finished my PhD in 2011 studying the dichotomous role of the innate immune response after spinal cord injury, followed by my MD in 2013.