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A serious car accident may have put Makenna Cody's plans to complete in power-lifting on hold, but, now on her way back, the accident isn't going to stop her

Bodybuilders and power lifters, actually anyone who takes fitness seriously, they believe in the age-old adage, no pain, no gain.

Twenty-two-year-old Makenna Cody certainly does.

Cody, an aspiring power lifter and certified personal trainer who works at the Zoo Health Club in Havre, has lived that mantra since she first started taking training and fitness seriously.

Unlike many power lifters however, Cody is now living that mantra for a completely different reason. She's living it because she has to. She's living it because she was left without a choice after a serious and horrific car accident nearly took her life this past February.

The pain she's going through now, it's the pain she must endure to come back from that accident, it's the pain she has to go through to return her body, and her life to a sense of normalcy - something that was taken away from her on that snowy, icy cold morning back in February.

Yet, because of her chosen lifestyle, Cody herself has little doubt she can, and will, recover, and in fact, she truly believes that, one day, she won't just be fully recovered from her accident, but she will be the competitive lifter she's always aspired to be.

It takes a lot of courage to change, it takes a lot of strength and will power to start living the lifestyle of a serious bodybuilder and weight lifter, and now, it's that will, and that conviction, that's guiding Cody back.

"I do believe that the shape I was in saved my life," Cody said one evening inside the Zoo. "The doctors all told me that, and continue to tell me that now. So I'm grateful for the lifestyle I was living, and I'm proud of myself for putting myself in the shape I was in. I believe that being in the shape I was in, it not only probably saved my life, and for sure lessened the injuries I could have had, but it's also helping in my recovery. So now, I guess I have an even greater appreciation for what I'm doing, a greater appreciation for being healthy and living the lifestyle I do. It means even more to me now."

Gain Through Pain

Cody admits she didn't always live the healthy lifestyle she does now, but, she also credits that to why she got to where she did.

A graduate of Havre High School in 2015, Cody said it was during that time that she made changes in her life, and the inspiration to do so came from within.

"I gained a lot of weight in high school, I was drinking a lot, I wasn't living very healthy at all," she said. "And I just got to a point where, I wanted to change my lifestyle, I wanted to be different."

The changes came by working at the Zoo, where she has been employed for the last four years. Of course, working at a health club is ideal for anyone who wants to lead a healthier lifestyle, and it certainly helped Cody do exactly that.

But, Cody had made up her mind early on that, she didn't just want to be a health club employee. She was thinking more long term, and in 2018, she achieved one of those goals by becoming a certified personal trainer.

Yet, that was only one of Cody's goals. The other was to become a competitive power lifter, and, for the last year, she began working diligently towards doing just that.

"Training is something I really love," she said. "I really love lifting weights. It's something that makes me feel good about myself. Plus, being a personal trainer, I think it's important to look the part. It's important to me, and that really motivated me to keep getting stronger."

Strong was putting it mildly. Cody was well on her way to achieving a big goal last winter - to compete in a professional powerlifting competition. But, in the blink of an eye, her world, and her goals, were turned upside down.

"I was actually going to do my first competition this summer," Cody said.

Life Changing

Montana winters are harsh. But the last two have been beyond brutal, and, last February was as brutal as it gets around these parts.

Cody, however, has no recollection of Feb. 3, 2019. The only thing she knows is, that morning, somewhere outside of Lewistown, her life changed.

"I know it was snowing and the roads were pretty bad that day," Cody said about the morning she was returning to Havre from a trip to Billings. "But I really don't remember anything about the accident. I might have overcorrected. But I really don't know for sure."

The accident was one that can happen on an ugly Montana winter day, to anyone. Cody says she thinks she may have hit some ice, and her truck, one she says she had just gotten, went off the road. It flipped in several different ways before coming to rest on its tires, dangerously close to a frozen pond.

Luckily, the response to Cody's accident - she was all alone on her trip, was swift by rural Montana standards, but it still left Cody fighting for her life after she was transported to Benefis Hospital's Intensive Care Unit in Great Falls.

Physically, Cody suffered only a broken clavicle and some bumps and bruises. In an accident that could have left her with major bodily injury, her doctors credit that to her excellent physical condition.

But, something much more serious happened in the accident.

"I suffered a traumatic injury to the right side of my brain." she said.

What that meant was, Cody was in trouble. She was alive, but, brain injuries are very, serious, and Cody's left her in a medically induced coma for a week.

Once she was out of the coma, she was moved to a rehab center for the next six weeks, where she began recovering from the affects of the trauma to her brain.

"I would say I really didn't come to my senses until about three weeks after the accident," Cody said. "I didn't know what had happened to me, I didn't even remember leaving Billings."

The injury to Cody's brain affected the entire left side of her body; it affected her ability to walk and to speak, and it also has robbed her of some of her long-term memory.

"I had to learn to walk all over again, I had to learn how to talk, and to read and write again," she said of her initial rehab. "I had to relearn how to swallow. It really affected a lot of things we just take for granted every day.

"Even now, I have a hard time walking sometimes, I don't have complete control of my left side. My timeline is off. I don't remember much of anything before my accident. The injury really affected my long-term memory the most."

The injury Cody suffered pretty much was life-altering, physically, and emotionally. But, being who she is, she wasn't going to take it lying down. That's not what people in Cody's world of fitness and weight lifting do. Instead, they meet challenges head on, and that's exactly what she did, and is continuing to do now.

"I look at pictures of my truck now, and I'm very thankful to be alive," she said. "I'm thankful to everybody who has helped me and supported me through this. My boyfriend Wyatt (McKinlay) has been amazing and been there every day for me. Rachel, here at the Zoo, she came to see me in the hospital, and has been so supportive, especially helping me eventually come back to work, because that was something I was intiially really worried about. Definitely my parents, they have been amazing through all of this, and I have an aunt who suffered the same kind of brain injury, and she's been someone who has been really good to talk to. I've just been really lucky to have so much amazing support through this."

Cody also has herself, and that's big, because, she's always been a determined, and strong-willed person, and that's a big key to her recovery - though she admits, things are by no means easy.

"The effects of my accident have been devastating," Cody said. "It's been a very slow and painful recovery. I still can't do a lot of things that I was doing before. I lost over 40 pounds that I had put on with my training. I'm fatigued a lot. I'm still now allowed to do a lot of the things I want to be doing, so it's hard, it's a struggle sometimes. But, I'm also very motivated. I'm thankful and grateful to be alive, and I'm motivated to get back to being myself."

Uplifting Future

Spend anytime around Makenna Cody and it's easy to understand why she has had a future in fitness. She's an energetic, strong, and inspirational person, and those things are necessary to get to where she got to before her accident, and where she wants to go with her future.

"I fully intend to get back to what I was doing before," Cody said. "Now more than ever, I'm motivated to be as big and as strong as I can be. I definitely plan to do a power-lifting competition eventually. And I want a career out of this. That was the goal before, and it still is."

The timeline may have gotten thrown off, and Cody's recovery is ongoing. She said she's not cleared by her doctors to do any heavy lifting, or heavy cardio training yet.

"I'm going at a slow pace right now," Cody said. "It's hard because some days, I look at the weights and I just want to start lifting like I used too, or I just want to jump on a treadmill and go. But, I'm not there yet. I'm doing some light dumb bell work, some very light lifting, but nothing like I used to do yet."

The pace may be slow, the recovery may be painful, but, Cody knows she'll get there. She's a fighter, and she's strong, and she's not only going to recover, not only put her accident behind her, but, she's determined to make a life out of her true passion.

"The motivation before was I wanted to be healthier, I wanted to be different," Cody said. "When you get into lifting, it feels so good when someone calls you and asks you to help them move a couch or something like that, because they know you're strong. It makes you feel good. And also, it's important because, as a personal trainer, you want to be taken seriously. That's what I wanted to be, and that's what I want to get back to.

"I want to take this as far as I can," she continued. "Whether it's owning my own gym someday, or becoming a weight-lifting coach, or something like that. I want to make this my career. I never wanted a 9-to-5 job, and college wasn't for me. This is what I love, this is my passion. It's what makes me happy."

In the world of weight lifting, pain makes people happy. You really can't find happiness without the pain. That's just how it works. Before the morning of Feb. 3, Makenna Cody loved to live that way. Happiness and personal achievement came directly from a certain amount of pain, and that's why the pain she's had to endure since that awful, snowy morning in the middle-of-nowhere Montana, isn't stopping her, it isn't getting in her way.

No, MaKenna Cody has goals, she has a life she wants to live, and pain didn't stop her before, and it's not going to stop her now. In fact, like most serious power-lifters, she welcomes it, and, after all she's been through, she's not just looking forward to that kind of pain again, she's craving it.

"Like I said, I'm more motivated than ever before," Cody said. "And I'm excited for the day when the doctors clear me to start training like I used too. I love it, and I can't wait for the day when I can start lifting heavy again."

That day will come for Makenna. She'll get there because she is strong, because she has endured, because she is self-motivated, and because she believes. Because of who Makenna Cody is, and because of where she's been, someday, she'll be pushing up big weights again. Someday soon, she'll find happiness from that unique love of pain a weight-lifter lives to love so much.

 

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