HENRYVILLE, Ind. (WDRB) -- When Mark Peredo was hit by a wrong-way driver on I-65 In April 2015, the last thing on his mind was hiking.
His foot was mangled, his nose shattered. He had to be pulled from his car by the "jaws of life." Today, all he can think about is planning a hike on one of the most famous trails in the world.
“I was angry at my situation,” Peredo said. “I was like, ‘How can someone end up on the other side of the highway? Was he trying to kill himself? Was he drinking?’”
The other driver was Luke Hutchins. He was on his way home from a shift at work, and for the first time in his life, he had a seizure.
He doesn’t remember the seizure or the wreck. He only remembers waking up in the helicopter that took him to the hospital. He ended up spending months in the hospital and went through test after test while doctors tried to determine what caused the seizure and subsequent seizures he began experiencing regularly. Eventually, doctors found that Hutchins had a rare form of epilepsy with two arteriovenous malformations in his brain.
“It's a birth defect that started developing when I was 15 years old,” Hutchins said. “It doesn't stop developing.”
Since then, Hutchins has battled seizures with different medicines, but there is no quick fix.
“I can't drive anymore. I can’t watch my kids by myself anymore. I can't walk alone anymore,” he said.
The two men did not know each other, but the wreck had similar effects in dismantling the lives they were living.
“Everything I've worked for and fought for to make my life what it is,” Peredo said. “My moment had fallen apart.”
Peredo’s business was slipping through his fingertips.
“In my mind I said, ‘I’ve got to maintain this,’” he said. “But I couldn't ... the medications, the pain. I tried, and I couldn't do it.”
Around three months later, Peredo’s father died. He needed a reset.
Prior to the wreck, Peredo had always contemplated hiking the Camino de Santiago, perhaps with one of his kids when they graduated college. But after his dad died, he felt like he needed to do it then.
“I was angry with everything,” he said.
The Camino de Santiago, also known as the Way of St. James, is a 480-mile series of trails in Spain and France. Legend maintains that the remains of St. James are buried along the trail. Many hike the path as a form of spiritual retreat.
“They say the first section is for the body, the second one is for the mind and the third is for the spirit or the soul.” Peredo said. “For me, I was in such a place that everything was just shattered and blended together.”
But Peredo said something still wasn’t right even after completing the Camino in just 28 days.
“Even though I had gotten over being angry and gone through my own forgiveness process, there was still a side of me that felt incomplete,” he said.
That’s when Peredo sought out Hutchins with an idea.
“Everybody’s walk on the Camino is different,” Peredo told Hutchins upon meeting him. “Is it something you would maybe like to experience?”
Reluctant at first, Hutchins eventually agreed.
“I'm in a situation now where I really have nothing to lose,” Hutchins said.
Next month, Hutchins and Peredo will make the pilgrimage of the walk of the Camino together.
“He knows why he wants to go. I know why I want to go,” Peredo said. “Adventure comes with struggle and comes with pain. Otherwise, it’s a vacation.”
Given Hutchins’ condition, the pair will be traveling with two other experienced hikers with first aid training.
“(Hutchins) will also be around other people, other pilgrims to walk with," Peredo said. "We may be going through stuff of our own, and he may be going through stuff, and he may not want to talk. So it will be good rotate too."
The trip is already booked, but they hope others can also help with funding the trip via a GoFundMe page.
“It's trying to bring something to his life,” Peredo said. “It’s symbiotic. I think we’re trying to bring something to each other’s lives."
“Blessings in disguise,” Hutchins said.
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