He was in agonizing pain from a birth injury - until a complex surgery "changed everything"

Tyler Theroux came into the world with a brachial plexus birth injury that kept his left arm dysfunctional and contorted in pain. As a child, he couldn't engage in playground activities like the monkey bars, and his classmates would bully him about the injury. 

Eventually, Theroux dropped out of school to be homeschooled. While the teasing stopped, the pain didn't: His parents watched him experience fresh agony with every growth spurt. The brachial plexus is the group of nerves that sends signals from the spinal cord to the shoulder, arm and hand, and that nerve pain kept him awake at night, despite multiple attempts at surgery and therapeutic treatment. 

Despite the pain, Theroux, 27, did his best to live a normal life, supported by his parents and brothers. He went to college to study recreational therapy, so he could help people with injuries like his, but a bad fall on ice — worsened by his inability to catch himself — aggravated his pain to new heights.