Update: Murfreesboro Post article Marty Luffman measures progress in recovery from near-fatal crash

Alabama native Marty Luffman has called the Smyrna area home for 48 years since he finished college in 1972.

He’s worked for the Tennessee Department of Agriculture, wrote the state’s first equine trail guide, competed in rodeos, helped to create the 23.1-mile Natchez Trace National Scenic Trail and sold insurance for 45 years.

“It’s an honor and a privilege, at my age, to have a legacy like this that I can leave,” said Luffman, 72, who was recognized by the Rutherford County Chamber of Commerce for his longtime insurance business last September.

On Aug. 3, the Antioch resident celebrated another life milestone: he went home to his ranch in Cane Ridge after an 81-day stay at a physical rehabilitation facility following a near-fatal car crash on March 6.

He’s a colorful storyteller who’s just trying to turn the page to the next chapter of his life with something as simple as enjoying a hot cup of coffee on a brisk summer morning.

Luffman had a morning ritual before beginning his rehabilitation journey. He would wake up, head out to the back deck, and say his prayers as the sun crept up to take its place in the sky.

Longtime Smyrna State Farm Insurance Agent Marty Luffman (left) flexes next to his physical therapist Felino Rosario (right) in the physical therapy room at the Life Care Center of Hickory Woods in Antioch. During his time there, Luffman would work on his arm, core and leg muscles with the physical therapy team to build up the strength he needs to walk again.TAYLA COURAGE

“That’s what I used to do every morning. I’d go out. I didn’t care how cold it was,” said Luffman. “I would love to go out and sit on the deck and watch the sun come up.”

After being admitted to the Life Care Center of Hickory Woods in Antioch on May 14, Luffman was still able to call on his nurses for a cup of joe, but the view from his single room was nothing compared to the picturesque nature scene outlooking his backyard.

He said he can hear the ribbits of frogs and the hoots of owls as well as the screeches and howls of bobcats and coyotes at night from the acres upon acres of woods behind his home.

“Going home for me will be a real morale booster,” Luffman said the day before he was released. He uses a wheelchair to get himself around these days. Late last week he posted photos of social media of himself sitting in a wheelchair on his back deck.

A photo taken at the collision scene on March 6 shows the white pickup truck that crashed into longtime Smyrna State Farm Insurance Agent Marty Luffman’s 1990 Chevrolet Corvette at the intersection of Highway 31 and Highway 96 near Triune.SUBMITTED

The recovery journey

During a recent interview at Life Care Center, Luffman wore grey gym shorts and a black sleeveless shirt, appropriate for hour-long sessions of physical therapy, and sat at a wooden table in what seems to be a small reading room at the facility.

The cowboy tattoo on his left bicep is on full display and his glasses are unfolded on the tabletop before him.

Luffman, also Smyrna’s official town historian, said he’s lost nearly 80 pounds since the crash, according to his latest weigh-in. He said the unexpected weight loss isn’t unwelcomed, but the loss of muscle as a result is something he’s working to build up to literally get back on his feet.

Luffman is learning to walk again with the musical accompaniment of The Temptations, The Four Tops and The Supremes from their appearances on “The Ed Sullivan Show” during his treatments that begin after breakfast at around 10:30 a.m.

“I’ve seen a lot of progress. It’s been wonderful,” said Luffman, who said he recently started to gain some of the feeling back in his legs. “When I got here, I couldn’t move either leg. I couldn’t feel anything from the waist down. Totally numb. Dead.”

The work he’s done with his physical therapists — from using the parallel bars to short stints on an exercise bike — has gotten him to the point where he can stand with the assistance of a sit-to-stand patient lift machine.

It’s a machine that resembles a speaker’s podium with a detachable belt to provide additional support for patients being lifted out of a seated position.

“They’ll put a belt behind me, and it’ll lift me up and then I’m able to stand up on my legs,” Luffman said.

Physical therapy will be something that sticks with him in the long term. He’ll continue his exercises three times a week at home to maintain his progress. A night nurse will stick around to assist him until he feels comfortable on his own.

Life Care Center Director of Rehabilitation Amelette Bolton said the facility assesses each patient to determine which forms of therapy (physical, occupational, speech, etc.) will be most beneficial for their healing process. Therapists work with their patients to craft a timeline with goals they can both work to achieve.

“He’s getting better and better, you know, and he works hard,” said Bolton, who believes a healthy mental attitude pays off in speeding up recovery time. “He doesn’t let depression get in the way because he’s very positive, you know. He’s very motivated, so that really helps him a lot.”

Recovery has by no means been an easy road for Luffman, who’s also a two-time cancer survivor, as progress is rarely linear.

“You go so far, and you’re doing really really good, and then all of a sudden for no reason, no explanation, your legs quit working, your arms quit working, your belly quits working, and there’s no logic to it, and that’s what happened to me,” said Luffman, painting the picture of what he describes as feeling emotionally “bottomed out.”

He confessed that the snags in the progress timeline he’s set for himself can fuel the fire of frustration to the point where he considers throwing in the towel. His faith and the outpouring of support he receives from friends, “prayer warriors,” and total strangers from across the globe have served as a point of encouragement to hang in there and keep pushing forward.

“I knew I had a lot of friends out there, but I didn’t know it was anything like this,” said Luffman on a social media post about his recovery that received over 700 comments of well wishes. “It’s just absolutely overwhelming.”

Kendric Rutz, a longtime Luffman friend who posts the rehab updates via Facebook, said he recalls an evening where Luffman was asking for a sign from above that things were turning around for him.

“He was itching his leg. He hadn’t been able to feel his leg or feel anything to scratch for so long, and he’s laying there itching his leg, going, ‘God, give me a sign,’ and then ‘Oh!’ ” said Rutz of Luffman’s lightbulb moment.

Luffman calls it a “little miracle,” something he’s asked for each day.

The crash

Luffman said he was cruising southbound along Highway 31 near Triune in a white 1990 classic Chevrolet Corvette when a driver in a large pickup truck quickly pulled out of a nearby market parking lot on the far side of Highway 96.

The truck came across the highway and into Luffman’s lane, smashing into the front end of his car. The truck’s tire drove up onto the Corvette’s hood before rolling back down.

“The highway patrolman that was there said that if he’d come about an inch further, his tire would’ve come through the windshield, and that would’ve killed me,” said Luffman, whose classic car contained no airbags.

He said his seatbelt did a number on his lungs. He recalls hitting his head on the steering wheel. The impact left him with several injuries, the main one being a couple of cracked vertebrae in his spine. He was initially sent home from the hospital still able to walk, but in a short time, things took a turn for the worse.

A friend had called an ambulance when Luffman was on the floor of his home, unable to move with a bladder on the verge of exploding. He was taken to a different hospital, where two liters of fluid were drained from his body. He was sent home with a catheter.

A urologist recommended Luffman spend some time at The Waters of Smyrna, a rehabilitation and skilled nursing center. He stayed there for just shy of two weeks before returning home again.

“It got progressively worse,” said Luffman. “I couldn’t walk. I couldn’t do anything.”

An MRI from another hospital finally revealed that his injuries had been more serious than what was initially thought.

“My spinal cord was torn in two, and I had a vein that was torn in two. It was bleeding,” said Luffman.

During the surgery to repair his spinal cord, the surgeon found a blood clot that had prevented Luffman from bleeding out. Luffman was shocked to learn that it was a clot that had saved him. Due to heart attacks he suffered about a decade ago, he has been taking two blood thinners to reduce the chances of clotting.

Recently, he was X-rayed which showed a few bone spurs in his lower back. He said his 18-year career of rodeo competitions was likely tied to that. The inflammation adds another challenge in his mission to rebuild his body.

Words to live by

Luffman said he’s not sure why people view him as an inspiration.

“I got some emails from people, telling me what an inspiration I was, how I had helped them and motivated them and brought them out of a dark spot,” said Luffman. “I’m thinking, ‘How? What have I done, you know, to help you?’ I can’t figure it out, but apparently several people that follow my progress are inspired by the effort I’m putting into it.”

Now, he hopes to take what he’s experienced and use it to let people know that they can continue to hold on to hope. He’s even been asked to speak at a few group functions on what he’s endured.

“What I would tell people, and it’s what I do tell people, is that this is in God’s hands, and God’s got a plan. It may not be my plan, but there is a plan, and whatever it is, it’s the reason I’m still alive today,” said Luffman. “I’ve got to be patient and wait and see what it is.”

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