“I believe that God spared my life for a reason, and it wasn’t to just sit down and accept what had happened to me. It was to overcome it.” Those are the words of Josh Grubb, the soon-to-be senior at Whitley County High School who less than a year ago was clinging to life after he sustained horrific injuries in a tragic head-on car crash that left several others injured and took the life of one person in another vehicle.
Grubb was a passenger in the back seat of the car that he was in. He and some friends had been on a hiking trip earlier in the day, and were on the way home. He had fallen asleep without a seat belt on. The next thing he remembers is waking up in the hospital.
“I remember getting into the car and falling asleep,” Grubb said. “I don’t remember anything about the actual wreck, but what I do remember is waking up in the hospital completely confused. They had me on a lot of drugs in the hospital, so at first, I thought that I was going to be okay. Then I looked at myself in the mirror.”
Grubb broke multiple bones in his face and head in the accident. He would end up losing his left eye, and he has a titanium plate in his skull. In addition to that, he lost much of the bone in his forehead. Doctors ended up taking donor material from another area of his body and using it to fill the hole so that his brain would be adequately protected.
Add to all of this a broken rib, a bent vertebrae and various other cuts, scrapes and contusions, and you could imagine Grubb’s shock when he was finally able to become fully aware of his situation after the accident.
“I probably stared at myself in the mirror for about ten minutes,” Grubb said. “I was not okay. I was hurting, but I didn’t know just how bad it was until then.”
This was all in the fall of 2023, with the high school cross country season nearing its end. Before the crash, Grubb had been looking forward to running alongside his fellow Colonels at the region championship meet and hopefully qualifying for a spot in the KHSAA state championships. Obviously, none of that came to pass.
A cross country runner since the seventh grade, Grubb was heartbroken about not getting to finish out the season with his teammates. Instead, he kept an eye on social media posts from his hospital bed as the rest of the Whitley County cross country team, along with dozens of runners from rival schools, all dedicated their performances to him using the hashtag #GrubbStrong.
It was a moving tribute, and helped to inspire Grubb to do the work necessary to get back to doing what he loves – running.
“I knew that it was going to be a very hard road,” Grubb said of beginning the rehabilitation process. “But I was willing to do whatever it took. When I first looked at myself in the mirror I knew that it was going to take months to get back, but I remember sitting there and telling myself that I would do it.”
And do it he has. Amazingly, Grubb has since made a full recovery and is preparing to compete this fall as a team captain for the WCHS varsity cross country team.
“I think that I’ve come a long way,” Grubb said. “I am almost completely back to where I was before.”
Getting back to this point has been nothing short of miraculous, especially considering the fact that Grubb had to re-learn how to keep his balance after the loss of his eye, or that he spent several weeks having to be fed through a tube due to his mouth being wired shut as it healed from reconstructive surgery.
“These scars show my story,” Grubb said proudly. “They show what I’ve been through, and how I overcame it.”
“Never give up,” Grubb said when asked what he has learned throughout this life-changing ordeal. “Something can be thrown into your life and be totally unexpected, but you can always attack what’s in front of you and overcome it.”
“Everything in life is just an obstacle,” Grubb continued. “The great thing about obstacles is that you can break them, you can move them, or you can push them out of your way. That wreck was my obstacle. Not eating and re-learning how to walk was an obstacle. I had to get my mind and my body past it, and I have. It’s all thanks to God, and I guess also to my stubbornness as well.”
Grubb thanked the community for all of their support during his recovery, including the many #GrubbStrong fundraising efforts that helped to pay for some of his medical bills. He and the cross country Colonels will kick off their 2024 campaign later this month.
