I did work in construction, so I had been working out lifting construction materials on a daily basis for years.  Before that, I worked out in two separate classes my JR and SR years in Highschool plus again after school for wrestling practice, so I have always been pretty strong.  I'm really grateful for that.  All of my strength was built up around lifting things up and packing it around.  Not pushing things down which is what we need to do to lift ourselves up so we can transfer.  I think what made me the strongest as far as being able to transfer like I can now is when I just refused to use the slide board anymore.  Think about before you broke your back/neck.  You know you could lift your butt up off of a chair then, so what is the reason you can't do it now?  There is no reason.  I found it to be completely psychological as I delt with the fear of "What if"  I knew I had the strength to do it, but my confidence was not there.  Also, it's like we're babies learning to walk for the 1st time.  It's new and scary to lift our butts up off of that secure place we had to find in learning how to balance ourselves while we are sat down.  So when we lift our butts up, the whole balance thing has to be learned all over again.  You just have to let go of the fear of falling, or maybe the fear of someone seeing you fall or knowing you fell and then having to deal with that whole bag of emotions.  Just remember that when we were babies, we fell all the time while we were learning to walk.

I'm completely aware there are higher level SCIs out there that can not do what I can do.  I am grateful everyday for what mobility I still have and what I can physically feel.  At the same time, I try not to envy what those with lower level injuries can do.