Jonathan writes about growing up in Sherbrooke, finding wheelchair basketball and attending the University of Illinois in this month’s Athlete Spotlight presented by Toyota.

I grew up in Sherbrooke, Quebec, a medium-sized city about 90 minutes east of Montreal. It’s a nice city – it’s where I started playing basketball at my high school. I have good memories of growing up in Sherbrooke – it’s not too far from the U.S. border, and there’s opportunities to participate in many outdoor activities.

I played a little bit of stand-up basketball in high school, but I didn’t play too many organized sports growing up. I was really active but not really into organized sports.

I grew up with my sister Karine, a year-and-a-half older, and my twin brother Philippe – I am four minutes older than my brother. These days, I would say it’s awesome having a twin brother. It wasn’t always awesome – we had a little period of time where there was some friction, but overall, it’s great. We’re the same age, same interests – a lot in common, so it’s nice.

My brother and I are pretty competitive when it comes to sports. We always played together on the same team, so there was never a situation where one of us won, and the other lost – that would’ve caused a fight. We were competitive to the point where we’d push each other to be better at whatever sport we played.

The accident and finding wheelchair basketball

In November 2000, when I was nine years old, my family and I were involved in a car accident near Trois-Rivières, Que. I don’t remember too many of the details. After the accident, we were in the hospital for about two months and then at a rehabilitation centre almost a year. I sustained a spinal cord injury as a result of the car accident. I am a paraplegic at the L1-L2 level.

With my sister, brother, and I all parlayed from the car accident, we wanted to find a way to remain involved in sport. We were all involved in sports before the accident.

At one point, while we were at the rehabilitation centre, we saw a demonstration of wheelchair basketball. After that, we spoke with our dad about starting a team – we already had three players – so we found a couple more athletes and started a team. We were called the Sherbrooke Patriots.

My dad did a lot for us in terms of getting involved with adaptive sports. He didn’t push me to play wheelchair basketball because I already had that desire to play, but he did everything to make it possible to play.

He was the one who created the team and found funding to buy chairs for the athletes and to buy court time. He did spend a lot of time and energy running the team. Without my dad, I probably would’ve eventually played wheelchair basketball, but he made it easy for the three of us.

Attending the University of Illinois 

I got to know coach Mike Frogley after I got involved with the junior national team. He introduced me to the idea of going to university and playing wheelchair basketball. I knew it was a great opportunity to perfect my English, to have a high level of training and go to school so that was a really great opportunity.

When I look back on my time at the University of Illinois, I was maybe a little too young, I didn’t know what I wanted to do exactly academic-wise, so I wish I had waited a year or two, so I was more mature and could get the most out of the experience.

I took kinesiology classes, but I was in general studies. My goal was to go the kinesiology route. At one point, I just decided it wasn’t for me, so I moved to Toronto to be part of the National Academy.

First Paralympic experience in Rio

I have mixed emotions about Brazil because it was a challenging year and a hard summer. We were grinding so much physically and mentally – it was difficult. Then we went to Rio, and we didn’t get the result we wanted at the Games.

Attending my first Paralympic Games, was awesome – it was in Brazil; Rio was a great city – so I would say it was mixed emotions when I think back on my first Paralympic Games.

Advice for new athletes

Go for it; try it out. There’s no reason not to give it a try. You don’t need to set your sights on making the national team when starting; just play for fun with your friends or on a local team. If you enjoy it and want to take it seriously, you can pursue it. But first and foremost, have fun.