Stephen Dearmond grew up on the Texas coast, working and repairing his family's rental properties after school. Fixing things is in his bones.
After graduating from Texas A&M with a degree in Chemical Engineering, Stephen started out in the fledgling tech industry at Motorola, then moved into a more traditional chemical engineering role at Dow Chemical. But somewhere along the way he realized he wanted work that felt more meaningful. He became a teacher, and after three years he knew it in his gut: this is what I was made for.
Then, on August 27, 1997, everything changed. A student attacked him, and the assault left Stephen with serious brain trauma. That he survived at all was something close to a miracle. What followed was a decades-long climb, the slow, stubborn work of rebuilding his brain from the outside in.
He made it back. Stephen fully regained his brain function and spent more than a decade serving a Sportsman's Church in Victoria, Texas, handling a long list of repair work and ministry duties.
Now he's in Houston, closer to his kids and grandkids, stepping into a grandfatherly role with his family and back to his loving, joyous self. And he's still doing what he's always done best: fixing things, and helping people.