Paralympian Wendy's mission to tell her story and inspire others

Since that moment almost three decades ago her strength and determination have been sorely tested but Wendy not only remains as mobile as possible - she also now spends her life trying to encourage and inspire others to overcome major adversity too.

Not only did it send her on an unexpected career path, she also took up sport again and went on to represent Great Britain in the 2005 Paralympic Games in Athens as part of the wheelchair basketball team.

Wendy was just 17, and had recently begun working as a secretary, when she was involved in a serious motorcycle accident in Chelmsford, where her family live and she grew up.

It was touch and go as to whether she would survive.

She remembers: “It was 1989 and I was on the back, as a pillion passenger.

“I suffered severe injuries including a fractured skull and my back was broken in four places. I also had a punctured lung and suffered multiple cardiac arrests.

“I pretty much died and they brought me back.

“I didn’t see a light or anything like that but I remember it was the most peaceful experience of my life and it felt very calm and I thought ‘wow’ this is lovely.

“Then they shocked me and there was a big flash and they brought me back,” she says.

Despite this, her family has since told her she was not expected to survive over the next three days and Wendy, who now lives in Tiptree, remained unconscious, at Chelmsford’s Broomfield Hospital, for the next three weeks.

“They told my parents, and my sister, I would not walk again but by the time I had come round it was like they had forgotten to tell me so no-one had actually told me or spoken to me directly about it so I did not feel like it was going to be permanent.

“I also think they could not bring themselves to tell me.

“Before the accident I was extremely active and the thought I would not be able to do all the things I did before was just devastating,” explains Wendy.

Once she had regained consciousness Wendy was transferred to the Stoke Mandeville Spinal Centre to begin rehabilitation.

For three months she lay on her back, paralysed, unable to move.

“It was horrendous.

“My sister kept me entertained and my mum and dad came every day too but I got so aggressive and just found it unbearable that everybody had to do everything for me.

“There were some staff I refused to let near me because I felt intimidated by them, even though they understood and were only doing their jobs, and I just felt so helpless.

“I remember I was talking to the lady in the bed opposite me one day and as we were speaking she suddenly began to have a heart attack.

"I couldn't do anything to help her.

“It was so unbearably frustrating and frightening,” she says.

But doctors at the unit kept telling Wendy they were “hopeful” she would regain feeling and soon there were miniscule signs that might be the case.

“My sister would always play with my feet when she visited each day and she suddenly noticed my toes were moving.

“I could not feel it at first but once it was obvious it was happening we all thought, ‘well this is it’.

“The toes are furthest from where the injury had occurred in my back so this was surely the beginning of it all being restored.

“But it was a long road from there for it all to start moving,” she admits.

When she was finally allowed to return home, the reality of her situation soon hit her.

“My mum and dad had already sorted out my sister’s room, which was downstairs, for me but I had so missed being in my own bed and I was determined to get up to my own room.

“I was on crutches but it was very slow and painful. In the end I shuffled up the stairs to my room on my bum but at that moment it dawned on me the hard road I was going to have ahead of me.”

Despite physiotherapists wanting her to wear splints and calipers, Wendy was determined to retrain her legs to manage without.

“I wanted a solution.

They kept saying that because I had spinal chord damage I needed them but I just wanted to get back to how I was before.

“We were always extremely active as kids, my dad always had us outside building things and we played lots of sports.

“My sister got me on a horse and I also took up cycling.

Which sounds ridiculous because I couldn’t pedal but it was great for my balance and basically someone would put me on it at the top of the hill and push me down,” says Wendy.

She began a determined attempt to build up the muscles in her body and gather as much strength as possible but even to this day she remains in almost constant pain.

“I found a wonderful gym and trainers who did everything they could to help me get back up on my feet.”

The training sessions coupled with Wendy’s determination mean she is now able to get about using crutches or a walking stick and can even walk unassisted for short distances.

Ironically, despite all her efforts to walk upright, her big break came in a sport which stipulates she must stay sitting down.

Wendy says: “One day a friend of mine, Paul Hardy, who is paralysed from the waist down, said he was going to try out wheelchair basketball and asked me to go along too.”

Wendy admits she did not hold out much promise for the Essex Outlaws session held at the Plume School in Maldon and after it had finished she did not think she had shown much promise.

“I had never been in a wheelchair before and I think I spent more time out of the chair than in it and I couldn’t shoot.

“Anyone watching would have told me not to bother going back but of everything on my body that hurt the most at the end, it was my face from laughing and smiling so much.”

The coach spotted promise in Wendy’s speed and strength and she was persuaded to attend a try-out for the Great Britain women’s team.

“I had always wanted to be an Olympic athlete, and now I had the chance, albeit in a slightly different way.

“After I was picked to train with the team the coaches told me if I trained really hard there was a very small chance I would be picked for the paralympics and it gave me a massive goal to aim for.

“I trained 20 hours a week and there were some days I just did not want to get out of bed, but I did, and then I was selected for the team.”

Wendy says representing her country at the Athens Games was an “unreal experience.”

“It opened my eyes to the adversities other people faced that were so much bigger than my own,” she admits.

Wendy was asked to compete at the Beijing games in 2008 but was beginning to embark on her own career and decided to instead become a basketball coach.

When London hosted the games she was invited to be a venue tester which allowed her unprecedented access to the historic event.

She still works as a basketball coach and tutor as well as working in a number of different environments including in team development, helping build confidence and self-esteem in business and sport, therapy services and within schools, as well as regularly giving motivational speeches to groups and organisations including a recent appearance at the Business Women’s Network in Earls Colne.

“I work with children who might find it difficult in school, which I really love.

“I am also just launching a clinic, one day a week, offering a new kind of therapy called Spectrum Emotion Coaching.

“It was developed by the Army to help with post traumatic stress disorder but it is now being used on a wider basis.

“It is a non-talking therapy so if you have been affected by a trauma you do not have to talk about it over and over again.”

Wendy explains the approach could soon become a standard procedure on the NHS.

“I am fascinated by human behaviour which is why I wanted to educate myself and now help other people,” she adds.

She will begin her sessions at Maypole Heath, in Maypole Road, Maldon, on March 1.