Mike Angstadt has always been an active guy, His idea of a good time is a workout known as The Murph: a 1 mile run, 100 pull ups, 200 push ups, 300 squats, and another 1 mile run. In a split second, his life changed. Now, with God’s help, Mike is on a long road to recovery.
Show Notes:
The Murph is more than a workout. It honors Navy Seal Lt. Michael P. Murphy, who gave his life for our country. His foundation has raised over 2,000,000 dollars providing scholarships for veterans. Find out more here.
Transcription:
Steve Sunshine:
We live in a time of unprecedented comfort. We value safety and security, and maybe that’s why it’s so easy for us to be shaken when the straight road we’re on takes a sudden curve and seems to be pointing us in a direction we don’t want to go. Welcome to the Shaken podcast. I’m Steve Sunshine. Your confidence, your mood, your perspective, even your faith may be shaken because of something that’s happened in your life. Jesus told us we’d have trouble in this world, so we’re shaken but not surprised. He also said, “Take heart. I have overcome the world.” In this podcast, you’ll hear honest conversations with people who have or are going through life altering hard times and have found that God was with them in the midst of it all. It’s easy to take for granted that life will continue as it is, but that’s far from guaranteed. My life, your life can change in the blink of an eye. So you could call this episode he married my cousin, part two because this is the second time… A couple of episodes ago I talked with Ibrahim who married my cousin, Elizabeth.
Now it’s Mike who married my cousin, Jamie, and I don’t know that there are any others that are going to come up like this. So I guess I’m promising not to make a habit out of featuring my own relatives. But Mike, how are you doing? Thanks for joining me.
Mike Angstadt:
Excellent, thanks.
Steve Sunshine:
Your story has to do with something that a lot of these stories are things that have happened over a long period of time. This was something that happened in a moment, right? Tell us what happened.
Mike Angstadt:
Yeah, it happened literally in a split second. On September 15, 2022, I left for work like I normally do. I got dressed, jumped on my motorcycle and headed to work. It’s a 63 mile commute to work. I left the house around 4:40 in the morning and roughly a mile later, a driver coming in the opposite direction crossed over two lanes and hit me head on.
Steve Sunshine:
Oh boy.
Mike Angstadt:
That’s as much as I know.
Steve Sunshine:
Yeah.
Mike Angstadt:
Any other details of the accident are all from eyewitnesses. I don’t remember a thing. I don’t remember even seeing a vehicle coming at me.
Steve Sunshine:
Tell us about the extent of the injuries and what that caused to happen.
Mike Angstadt:
Upon impact, I was thrown approximately 60 feet and ended up against the stone wall, but the injuries were a traumatic brain injury to the back of my head, four vertebrae end plate fractures. I had broken ribs, I had a lacerated spleen. I tore my colon and small intestine. My pelvis was fractured in multiple locations. I broke off my femur head on my left leg and my left leg femur was shattered.
Steve Sunshine:
Is this a case where… Did anybody at any point say, “We’re amazed that this guy is still alive?” Because it sounds like it based on all those injuries.
Mike Angstadt:
Well, yeah. When I was taken to the hospital by the ambulance, they said I was aware the whole time. I talked to the police officer on the scene and gave him Jamie’s name and number. Reading the doctor’s notes and the nurse’s notes from the hospital, my initial notes were patient is aware, but later reading what got me was the very next… I had initial intake note from the hospital, but the very next note, they had a pastor come see me. People go to the emergency room all the time, but not everybody gets a pastor sent to see them. The extent of my injuries, I believe that I don’t think they believe I was going to do very well.
Steve Sunshine:
What was the next experience that you were aware of? I mean, at some point you woke up and what was happening?
Mike Angstadt:
Yeah, roughly two to three days later is when I became aware. I woke up, I was intubated and restrained I guess prior to me becoming conscious. I guess Jamie had said that I was kind of pulling at things like the tube down my throat and things like that. They restrained me, but my first moment aware was I woke up and I couldn’t talk of course because I was intubated and restrained.
Steve Sunshine:
Did you immediately remember that there had been an accident or was it more like, where am I?
Mike Angstadt:
It was more like I had no idea what happened. I have no recollection of anything up to that point. From morning of September 15th up to that point, which was approximately, like I said, approximately three days later.
Steve Sunshine:
Wow. What went through your mind?
Mike Angstadt:
Well, the first thing was that I couldn’t talk and Jamie was there to keep me calm and talk to me and just gave me a brief, “This is what happened. You were in an accident.”
Steve Sunshine:
Okay, and emotionally did that… What were you feeling?
Mike Angstadt:
See, I don’t know if it’s amazing part to me was throughout that whole process, of course there were moments of emotion, but I remember just feeling calm.
Steve Sunshine:
Did you sense that that was God’s presence or was it just a calm that’s kind of hard to explain.
Mike Angstadt:
I mean, looking back, I know it was God’s presence. Looking back and reading the different accounts seconds after the accident, a woman that was two cars behind me stopped, stayed and was praying with me. She stayed until she had to leave to make an airport flight. So God’s hand was in all of this.
Steve Sunshine:
Yeah.
Mike Angstadt:
So I mean, looking back, I know it was God’s presence. But yeah, I mean I woke up with all of these injuries and I think I was unusually calm.
Steve Sunshine:
Yeah. How long were you in the hospital?
Mike Angstadt:
I was in the intensive care unit and the different trauma floors for 15 days. The initial timeline that they gave Jamie was much longer than that. They had told her that I would be intubated for more than a week, and then they broke it down, but they had me in the hospital for more than a month before they even transferred me to rehab. But as it turned out, it ended up being 15 days.
Steve Sunshine:
Wow.
Mike Angstadt:
And then to rehab for another roughly 15.
Steve Sunshine:
It’s a long list of injuries and I mean the first miracle of the story is that you survived, but I can only imagine that with everything that you sustain, that this is a marathon more than a sprint. And so what’s the recovery been like?
Mike Angstadt:
I mean, there’s been moments when it’s been tough. The first, well that first month, so I lost all use of my left leg during that time. I kept calling it my boat anchor. It would actually fall out of the hospital bed and there was absolutely no way I could lift it up. I have to call a nurse, have them come pick my leg up.
Steve Sunshine:
Yeah.
Mike Angstadt:
I had zero use of it for, well, it was much greater than a month, but that was tough, not being able to even roll over, nothing like that. They have these cool things now, I guess if you want to call them cool. It’s basically they put you in a sack and they pick you up with a little crane to move you, and that’s how they would move me from the bed to the recliner or whichever, but I was literally no help during that time.
Steve Sunshine:
And how did you like the crane thing?
Mike Angstadt:
Well, I didn’t mostly because it would kind of cinch you up to a point and I had broken ribs and everything else going on, so it would just cause a great amount of discomfort.
Steve Sunshine:
Okay, and how are you doing now?
Mike Angstadt:
I’m doing pretty well. I still have lingering injuries, some that won’t ever go away and some I’m still working on strength and endurance and things like that. One of the things that won’t ever go away is I have nerve damage on the outside of my left leg from my hip to my knee, which has atrophied the muscle, which doesn’t help with strength.
Steve Sunshine:
Yeah.
Mike Angstadt:
And then there’s other issues at times. I was resectioned, so I’m missing part of my colon. I’m missing more than 12 inches of small intestine.
Steve Sunshine:
Oh boy.
Mike Angstadt:
For six months, I had a colostomy bag and they were at least able to reverse that, so I don’t need to deal with that, but there’s lingering side effects with that occasionally as far as my intestinal tract.
Steve Sunshine:
How has the accident changed the way you live now?
Mike Angstadt:
I have to do things much different in many ways as far as physical things. I’m not as sure on my feet because I’m not as strong. Just me picking something off the floor is difficult. It’s almost like I have to stop, think about it and then do it. Or if I have to get down on the floor for anything, I love working on cars, but me getting down on the garage floor is almost a joke now. It’s almost comical how I have to get down and get back up. But yeah, I mean, I have pretty much taken in stride as far as it’s just another challenge.
Steve Sunshine:
Do you feel like this has changed in any way, either positively or negatively your relationship with God?
Mike Angstadt:
I mean, if anything, it is drawn me closer. I mean even different trials in my life. I mean, it just seems like I always draw closer to him in those times, and like I said, from seconds after the accident, we know God’s been… Has had his hand in this through that first woman that was praying with me or different people that have come, just strangers that have come to the hospital. When I was in rehab, the night shift manager came in and introduced herself and handed us a poster. She’s like, “Hi, I’m from church. Our small group’s praying for you. We all wanted to give you this.” And it was just a poster of Philippians 4:13. “I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength,” but I’m sure I’m leaving things out. But it is just, I know God’s hand has been in all of this.
Steve Sunshine:
The Holy Spirit motivates or leads some other believers to come and to provide comfort, and that’s him working through them. That’s very powerful.
Mike Angstadt:
Yes.
Steve Sunshine:
If you knew somebody in a similar situation to yours, maybe where you were a year ago or whenever it was during a time that would’ve been particularly challenging and they’re asking questions like, why did God allow this? Or I guess I’ll just leave it there, rather than throw too many things at you, what would you say to that person to encourage them to use this as a way to get closer to God rather than not?
Mike Angstadt:
Well, I mean, I’ve asked that same question to myself. Why? And I mean through all of this, I mean, both my wife, Jamie, and I have felt that there’s a bigger purpose to this trial and this is our, I mean, we’ve talked about our story to other people, but never in a format like this. But it’s to help people through different trials, whatever they may be. But I would just encourage people to seek him out. Don’t shut yourself off because of what’s happened. The other thing is having people around you to encourage you with God’s word or other things.
Steve Sunshine:
I think the piece about not shutting him off is important. And we did an episode earlier with a guy who wrote a book about the Book of Job, and the book is… Anybody who’s read it knows it’s challenging, it’s mystifying. It might be frustrating at times. It poses as many questions as it answers, but it does show you that God allowed Job to come at him with his complaints and he didn’t give him the answers he wanted, but he also didn’t say, how dare you? I think the important thing is that that communication with him stays open, that you’re still expressing what you feel and being honest with him. If you’re leaning into God, he will lean back into you. I really think that’s true.
Mike Angstadt:
I mean, absolutely, and as far as God’s hand being in things, the night before the accident I had just started, that was my first night. I was helping with a group of teen boys at church, a leader. At the time, they were 10th grade boys, now they’re in 11th grade. But that was my first night with them was the night before the accident, and the Holy Spirit led me to that decision to start doing that. It wasn’t something I have ever wanted to do, but I did. I opened myself to that opportunity and started the very next morning, the accident.
Steve Sunshine:
What was that interaction like when you were able to see them again after all that time?
Mike Angstadt:
My first time back was hard. I was still in a wheelchair, but we talked about the accident and I talked to him about forgiveness because I remember one of the first things after waking up and finding all the details of the accident was I forgave that driver. No matter what he was doing, they estimate either on his phone or sleeping.
Steve Sunshine:
Oh boy.
Mike Angstadt:
One of the two things, but I had to forgive him. No matter what happened, I had to forgive him first. So we talked a great deal about that with the group of boys.
Steve Sunshine:
Yeah, that’s huge. That’s huge. It’s hard, but it frees you up. That way you’re not enslaved to the bitterness that could grow in somebody who doesn’t forgive.
Mike Angstadt:
And not forgiving and being bitter like that, that would not help me recover.
Steve Sunshine:
No.
Mike Angstadt:
You’re focusing on that rather than what you need to focus on.
Steve Sunshine:
You mentioned Philippians 4:13 that somebody wrote for you in a card, but were there any other scripture verses that you drew strength from in this?
Mike Angstadt:
I mean, I’ve always leaned on Isaiah, “Those that wait upon the Lord will renew their strength.” That’s always been one of my favorite verses. So I mean, I thought about that often and I don’t know why, but it’s always stuck with me.
Steve Sunshine:
Have you changed in any way? Has this made you a different person?
Mike Angstadt:
In certain aspects of life, yeah. I mean I was always driven hard to, as far as work went. Granted, in the last several years, I mean that attitude changed for the better, but even to a more extent now, it’s like I know I have to go to work. I know I have to provide for my family, but I don’t have that extra drive to say, okay, I’m going to work extra hours to do something. We’ll accomplish it. We will get it done when we get it done.
Steve Sunshine:
Yeah.
Mike Angstadt:
The physical aspect has changed a lot of things. I was always very active. I never shied away from anything physical. For those out there that know anything about CrossFit workouts, my favorite workout was the Murph. It’s basically, it’s a mile, it’s a 100 pull-ups, 200 pushups, 300 squats and another mile. That was my favorite workout.
Steve Sunshine:
Yeah.
Mike Angstadt:
I mean, since the accident I haven’t been able to do a pull up. I’m hoping to get back there, but that has changed a lot as far as what I do in my off time. I’m not sure where else I may have changed. I’m sure my wife, Jamie, could expand on that.
Steve Sunshine:
Well, that’s where we’ll go to get the truth.
Mike Angstadt:
Absolutely.
Steve Sunshine:
I guess we talked a little bit about you grew closer to God. Do you feel like you learned anything new about him?
Mike Angstadt:
It has reaffirmed that he is good all the time. Even though this happened, even though the pain that I went through, he’s good all the time.
Steve Sunshine:
Yeah.
Mike Angstadt:
In the grand scheme of things, this is a blip in my life.
Steve Sunshine:
What do you want people to know? You had talked about when we talked about doing this, you guys have been looking for ways to give God glory for it, and I think that’s something that I’ve learned about through my Parkinson’s journey that I instinctively wanted to do that. I’ve talked with lots of other people on this show that feel that way. Tell me a little bit about that. Let’s talk a little bit about giving God glory and what that means to you.
Mike Angstadt:
And as we were sitting in the hospital, Jamie, it just kind of one day she just said, “This is going to be a story for his glory.” And that’s what we’ve kept on with that and on that. And like I said, this is the first opportunity to do something very public. I mean, we’ve talked to people, friends and everything like that to try to encourage through my story. But yeah, it’s just that everybody connects in different ways, but we’re hoping that my story and the aspects of what happened helps people because I mean, there’s hundreds of motorcycle accidents or car accidents every year where people are injured, severely injured. I mean, hopefully you could connect to some of those people to help them through that trial and know that there is light at the end of that tunnel, staying and leaning on God and getting your strength through him.
Steve Sunshine:
Yeah. Awesome. Hey Mike, before we wrap up, is there anything else you want people to know?
Mike Angstadt:
Don’t be angry because of whatever happened. Don’t be angry at God. He didn’t cause it to happen. I mean, we don’t deserve the blessings we have, but I mean, lean on him and you’ll make it through the trial.
Steve Sunshine:
Yeah. Very good. Mike, thank you so much for joining us. I really appreciate you taking the time and it’s always good to see the strength that you’ve drawn through him. You’re a strong person anyway, but giving him the glory for that and being able to come through this the way that you have with your love for God totally intact is very cool. And I think it’s going to inspire some people.
Mike Angstadt:
That’d be great.
Steve Sunshine:
And thank you for listening to Shaken. Would you help make sure others find this podcast? There are several ways you can help. Share Shaken with a friend. Give Shaken a good review and rating. Subscribe to Shaken so you never miss an episode, and you can find more episodes at purposely.com or on your favorite podcast app.
