I have two races left for the season and am raising the money to cover the costs for US Sprint Canoe Kayak National Championships in Oklahome August 3-6 and Lake Crab Tree races in NC.  Any help is greatly appreciate and welcome.  

Forged by Adversity

​My name is Brandon Holiday, I’ve been an athlete my whole life, playing various sports, tennis, baseball and training in martial arts.  I attended a division 1 school where I was awarded a partial athletic scholarship to play tennis and competed for two years in the Ranger Challenges.  After college I became a police officer and due to an injury in the line of duty and medical complications from Systemic Lupus I was unable to continue as a police officer and began to adjust my life because of the changing symptoms of my disease. If you don’t know what Lupus is, it is an autoimmune disease where the body attacks itself and causes symptoms like chronic fatigue, pleurisy, high fevers, restlessness, and loss of kidney function.   As a person living with Systemic Lupus, Primary Addison’s, and a blood clotting condition called Antiphosolipid Syndrome. 

​

2006 was another life changing event. After four months in the hospital battling with blood clots, wound care and hyperbaric chamber treatments, doctors had to amputate my left leg below the knee. Uncertain if I would ever be able to play sports again, or if I would have more complications with blood clots, that would affect my life drastically. I began physical therapy and doing what I could to control the outcomes.

​

The issue with the challenges I have faced with my injuries and disease has been that when I have reached out for help to cope; I didn’t get the help from the medical professionals, who came into my hospital bedroom, they just gave me a five minute written test and mental health diagnosis of being a manic depressed person.  I don’t know anyone that would not have some depression after spending months in a hospital in severe pain, watching a part of their body waste away.  It was up to me to do the research and look for other alternatives to help myself face this loss, life changing event. The system wasn’t going to help patients mentally and physically heal, so I contacted Challenged Athletes Foundation who awarded me a grant to travel and attend the Extremity Games.

​

From that moment on I knew that there had to be more than just accepting you’re depressed and here is some medicine to help. I began physical therapy, rebuilding my life, and Ten months later I attended the Extremity Games. Extremity Games is an extreme sports event for people with amputations and/or spinal cord injuries, hosted by Athletes with Disabilities Network. It was there that I met other challenged athletes and was able see people with disabilities surf, rock climb, wakeboard and ride motocross.  I realized then that I can do anything, do what these other athletes were doing.  I was empowered by these athletes and felt like I was regaining that competitive nature I had before.

In total, I have had 10 heart attacks, pleurisy, stasis wounds to my legs, skin grafts, mini pulmonary emboli’s and other medical issues caused by the lupus. I have had a life of constant changes and my disease is a daily adjustment because each day is never the same with the amount of energy, pain, fatigue that I may have to deal with.  From all these experiences I have learned that it’s easy to take a negative situation and look at it the wrong way. I refused to let that happen since and use those emotions and energy to train, be proactive, learn what supplements and medication works to help myself stay healthy, and make a difference. 

​

I will always be in the fight and take what you perceive as a limitation and change it to limitless possibilities by adapting.

Since 2007, I have won bronze medal in mix martial arts competing in a pancrease competition, silver medal in recreational kayaking and paddled my kayak into five gold medals at the United States Sprint National Championships, becoming the 2014 and 2015 K1, Paracanoe men’s 200m & 500m United States Paracanoe Sprint Kayak Champion and the 2014 Master’s 35+ Able Bodied 500m Champion. 

Over the past 10 years I have been working with other disabled community members, veterans through adaptive sports and mentoring outreach.  I see the smiles and light in their eyes as they try and succeed at the adaptive clinics. Being able to see the changes in attitude and focus of the people whose lives we impact through sports and outreach helps me heal mentally and physically.  The power of sport has changed my life for the better.

​

In April I made the Team USA, US National Paracanoe Team.  We traveled to Germany to compete at World Championships; which is out qualifier for to compete at the 2016 Paralympics.   I did not advance at competitions to make the US Paralympic Team, I still have more competitions and training this season and will push to improve for 2020 Toyko Paralympics.  In order to achieve these goals I will need to continue training and the support of everyone to accomplish these goals.