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Dear Friend:

"You'll never walk again."

More than 13,000 Americans will hear these life-changing words for the first time this year - and every year, unless we make a change!

Mike Utley lived and breathed football and had his whole future ahead of him. He was 26 years old and had already enjoyed three successful years with the Detroit Lions. However, on November 17, 1991 his whole life would drastically change in a split second. While playing against the Los Angeles Rams, Mike Utley blocked his opponent and fell to the ground. As Utley lay there the fans and his teammates were silently waiting and watching. As #60 was carried off the field he courageously gave the Thumbs Up sign to let everyone know that he was going to be all right and that he would return.

While confined to his hospital bed, Utley was told that he "would never walk again." He had crushed his sixth and seventh vertebrae in his neck and was paralyzed from the chest down.

What the doctors did not know was how powerful Mike Utley's fighting spirit and courage was. He came back not to play football but to win at something much bigger. To win the game of walking again. Not only for himself but for the thousands of men, women and especially the children around the world.

In 1992 the Mike Utley Foundation was created, to help support research, education and rehabilitation to all those that suffer spinal cord injuries.

We know there is a cure for this devastating injury, even more so now with newly released genetic mapping information. We just can't find it without your help!

Just a few years ago, researchers believed there would never be a cure for spinal cord paralysis.

Today, research the very kind we need to fund is more promising, more aggressive than ever before.

Things we couldn't even dream of a few years ago are a reality today.

• Researchers have succeeded in splicing together cut spinal cords - especially promising for people who can be treated right after their injury.
• Research has uncovered new ways of stimulating the spinal cord - greatly increasing the promise of increased control and movement.
• We've seen extraordinary new wheelchairs - wheelchairs that can climb steps, "walk" on the beach, and even help the user reach the top shelf.

The Mike Utley Foundation has three purposes; the primary function is to raise money for research. The Foundation wants to send as much financial assistance as possible to research centers around the world in order to develop cures for the more than 25 million people who live with spinal cord injuries.

Secondly, the Foundation educates people in wheelchairs, as well as their families and friends. A spinal cord injury is not just a personal injury. It's really a systems injury. It affects an entire community!

The third purpose of the Utley Foundation is to help people to understand that rehabilitation is one of the most critical parts of recovery. Mike Utley played the game of football with great intensity. Now that intensity is focused on his rehab. Which allows him to get one-step at a time closer to walking.

Mike believes that this injury cannot change you unless you allow it. "Do something today that you didn't do yesterday. You don't know what will happen tomorrow!"

Mike Utley will never give up, not today, not tomorrow, not ever, because tough times never last, tough people do!

The gift that we give individually produces the cure that we fund collectively.

With your generous support we can and will find the cure for spinal cord paralysis and help those today with this injury have hope for tomorrow.

With your donation we can help all people with some type of neurological dysfunction!

Just like on the football field - no one can succeed or win alone. We need you on our team. The team of Giving in Motion. We are grateful for your help and support.

Sincerely,

Mike Utley Foundation