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McCook woman vows wheelchair won't define life
EDITOR'S NOTE: The story of Crista Hudson's young life, from family strife to "booze-cruizing," to rehabilitation and refocusing after a car accident will be told in three installments.
McCOOK, Nebraska -- The pretty brunette, with the dark eyes and infectious smile, almost 21 years old, will get around for the rest of her life in a wheelchair.
While to some a wheelchair is a symbol of limitations, Crista Hudson of McCook, Nebraska, is determined that it won't define her life.
In fact, Crista says, the wheelchair has given her a focus, a purpose, a definition to her young life, and to her future.
Before the car accident that damaged her spinal cord, two years ago, on Dec. 1, 2008, Crista says, she was lost, struggling to adapt to changes in her family life, trying so very hard to fit in at school. Now, just past the two-year anniversary of her accident, Crista admits there are still lots of questions for which she doesn't have answers, but she's living by herself and she's been honored by her rehabilitation hospital for her "can-do" spirit.
She's attending college classes, studying sociology and criminal justice. "Who would have thought?" Crista asks, with a mischievous grin on her face.
"My dream job? To work in the FBI's behavioral analysis unit, studying the elements of a crime, interpreting offender behavior and linking it to the type of person who could commit it." This job would meld Crista's interests, she said, criminal justice, psychology ... teh study of human nature.
After graduating from McCook Community College, Crista will have to move to Lincoln for more classes at the University of Nebraska. "Grandpa raised me to be a 'Lincoln girl'," Crista said. "He's always wanted me to realize there's more out there than Trenton. There's ballet, and plays. I love it in Lincoln -- there's so much I'm interested in."
It wasn't too many years ago that Crista could not imagine those opportunities because she couldn't see past the hurt in her family, and, at school, crushing peer pressure and a typical teen's need to fit in somewhere.
Crista's biological father wasn't part of her life as she grew up. "We searched for him, only to find him in prison," Crista said. "My whole life growing up, my step-dad was the only real dad I had."
Then Crista's mom, Wendy Brown of Trenton, and her step-dad started fighting a lot, Crista said, and she felt that she and her little brother, Zane, were often turned against each other, or that she was caught in the middle. "I was old enough -- probably 11, 12 years old -- to understand what was going on -- Zane wasn't," Crista said. She was pulled two directions by her mom and her step-dad, she said, until, "eventually, I stopped talking to my (step) dad. It was hatred, almost."
Crista's mom and step-dad divorced, and her mom's new boyfriend was a strict disciplinarian with unreasonable expectations. "He wanted Mom to be so hard on Zane and me. We had to be perfect, live by his rules. It tore Mom and me apart ... to a point where, at the time, I hated her, too."
Crista paused, struggling for the right words. "That's when things started getting bad."
"I had a friend who spent the summers with her dad in McCook, and my mom let me spend all summer with them -- and there was no adult supervision," Crista said.
The friend's cousin was four years older, "and a hard-core partyer. We were drinking big-time and smoking pot big. And eventually -- when I worked up the nerve -- the boys began."
"I'm basically shy," Crista said. "But with enough alcohol, I wasn't shy anymore."
Her confidence soared -- "I could do anything I wanted to when I was drunk" -- she said.
Back home in Trenton, she started sneaking out at night, and she and her mom got into huge fights, arguments that escalated at times into physical altercations.
There was no escape at school. "I hated school in Trenton," Crista said. "I was bullied from kindergarten. I was never good enough."
At 16, Crista said, she had had enough, and she moved to McCook to live with her grandparents, Gloria and Dave Mefford. "That's where I was doing all my partying anyway. I might as well live there," Crista said.
Crista admits she turned her grandparents' world upside town. "I really put a toll on my grandparents," Crista said.
"I had a boyfriend who smoked pot all the time -- ALL THE TIME -- and he never went to school. I pretended to go to school, but I didn't," Crista said.
"I don't remember all of it -- I blacked out a lot. I'd pass out, but I was aware enough to know that people were messing with me," Crista said.
At that time, the only positive thing in Crista's life, she said, was dancing. "All I had was my dance. I was so into dance," Crista said. So, it not only embarrassed her terribly, but it also broke her heart when her mother had Crista declared "uncontrollable," and police officers picked her up after her spring dance recital. "What hurt me the most was that Mom couldn't tell me," Crista said.
Crista was moved to a boys/girls home. "It was real, real hard," Crista said. "It took everything I had not to cry. I couldn't let anyone see me cry. But in my room, the tears fell."
Two weeks later, Crista moved to Carla and Charles Colton's foster home in Imperial, and things started looking up.
"That was the best thing that ever happened to me," Crista said. "I got my act together."