elbow up was no bigger than his wrist.

By his shoulder was a mass balled-up like a fist. His biceps muscle had torn free from his elbow and rolled up in his arm.

Parsons wouldn’t work again for eight months. If there was a silver lining it was that Parsons, who is right-handed, had suffered the injury to his left arm.

What a skilled PT knows

For Parsons, the burning passion for his chosen profession came early in life, in Petersburg, Huntingdon County, a little town in central Pennsylvania where his father was fire chief.

“Just grew up with it,” Parsons said. “It was always a part of our life.”

Starting as a volunteer firefighter at age 16, Parsons moved to the Harrisburg area after high school to study fire science at Harrisburg Areathe tedium involved with eight to nine months of therapy and time away from his job and firehouse family.

“That was definitely mentally taxing for him,” she said.

At one point Parsons had progressed to curling a one-pound dumbbell – a pink one, at that – on his own while an 80-year-old woman near him was rehabbing with a 10-pound weight.

Fear was a factor, too. Parsons wondered whether he would get full range of motion and full strength back. The long road to recovery would get more challenging – but with more tangible signs of success – as spring gave way to summer.

Returning to work

In mid-June, Parsons transitioned to a work conditioning program designed to resemble his actual job duties. Four hours per day, five days per week, Parsons’ therapists