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hey Runners only with dime Harley Runners only with dom Harvey and um evidently an old friend of mine Penny
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Taylor hello hi how you doing yeah you're good this is slightly awkward we just established that we're like old
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mates from palmy North you you were good friends with my girlfriend Kim I was remember and I'm sorry
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a lot a million years ago yeah it is wonderful to have you around here on the podcast uh we follow each other on
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Instagram I've been inspired by you I know a lot of people that'll be listening to this or watching this will
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be like I don't know who Penny Taylor is um and if that's you I urge you to stick
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around because it's a it's a hell of a ride well this has been your reality for like
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the last 14 years and I I wonder this is the first time you've gone on a podcast
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um how do you like how does it make you feel when you tell the story um sometimes like one-on-one I'm really
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good I can just tell the story to a big crowd I get emotional which is weird um and I've never really I've always
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shied away really I haven't really talked about it that much I'm okay with
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it um but just have really put all my energy and focus into recovery and surviving those first few years and now
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thriving yeah oh it's it's so inspirational the the getting emotional in a big room thing do you think that's
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because you sort of feed off the energy of the crowd you see the the emotion that they're going through and you sort
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of feed off that maybe yeah I don't know it's just something weird it's like I
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know other people that can stand up and talk about their stories like really confidently and I admire them but it's
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just not something I can do really yeah okay well let's get into the story that
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we're talking about um take us back to 36 year old Penny Taylor in November 2009.
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yep so I was a single mum so I had Sam who was seven and who was now 20. um and Jade was three and who is now 17.
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um and so we were just you know it was November it was a busy time at work it was also a social time at work you know
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with Christmas parties Etc um and um yeah we did have function on the Saturday night for work
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um was completely fine didn't overdo it you know too too too badly your foot
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you're from Palmers to North we we were swimming in the same Waters yeah a apartment you're not overdoing it that's
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a couple of bottles of wine yeah that's it and we finished off at the dirty old
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cob um anyway um yeah so then the next few days went by um and then on the Thursday morning I
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woke like really early about five o'clock in the morning and um just felt nauseous and was gonna
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almost just vomiting and so I was dragging myself to the toilet vomiting going back to bed um I had the kids at
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home with me um I did manage to text their dad and say could you pick them up and take them
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to school because they don't think I'll be doing that today so he was good he
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come around picked them up did what he needed to do with them um he did realize that he thought I
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didn't look that good um and he did alert my mum and said that um he'd been around put the kids up
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didn't know how well peony actually was at that point in time so to me all I'd
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had was vomiting so um as the day went on I just continued to be in and out and sleeping vomiting
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sleeping vomiting basically um four o'clock in the afternoon my mum finishes work and I'm
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resilient for and I just have to lock the door like I never not lock my front door it's just a
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thing I've always done and for whatever reason this day whether Jason didn't
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lock it on his way out or um I don't know how but it was unlocked where do you live in public library
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you would think so wouldn't you yeah yeah for anyone that doesn't know their
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geography they're like the bad area yeah yeah um and so fortunately it wasn't locked
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so my mum finished work she came by um came in and I was unconscious at that point and she was trying to raise my you
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know alertness and she couldn't she couldn't get anything from me I don't
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remember her arriving at all um and so so I'm just going to pause you there so in the space of like 12 hours
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you went from the start of like what you assumed was like a flu or a virus so it was like
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five in the morning yeah that I first noticed feeling unwell and this was four in the afternoon 11 hours later yeah so
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what I put it down to is a vomiting only was I'd picked up a bug from the kids
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like Jade was at daycare and Sam was at school so you know if you like everything yeah so that's what I had
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thought but by the time mum had got to me say around 4 30 I think it was um I was incoherent and I don't remember
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her arriving um so because she couldn't raise you know anything from me she rung the
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ambulance they turned up um I have no recollection of this at all mom said when they put me into the
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ambulance they had alluded the hospital that it was like code four or whatever it was they had given me half an hour to
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live by the time I arrived um and Mum said on my way to the hospital she's noticed a black spot on
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my leg and then by the time I got to the hospital the black spot had grown all the way up my leg and was basically
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taking over my body which was just like your limbs dying yeah so that's the meningococcal
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so once so literally they they threw me into a e um everyone was gowned up from head to
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toe with the big like white masks everything um so you remember this or you just yeah
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um so they tried so they quickly realized that it was meningococcal and they quickly tried all the normal drugs
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that they would give you to do that to try and slow that progress down I was well too far gone by that stage
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um so then they put me up to ICU and I remember mum saying that the doctor had told her to take me like to the nurse
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take me straight up I needed to get on the machines and they were dilly-dallying around in this doctor let
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rip apparently because the time was so crucial so we got up to ICU and Palmerston North
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Hospital and I was literally strapped to everything no one to mankind at that point they had given me so by the time
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they stretched me all up they realized the extent of it all so all my organs had failed so my liver my kidneys
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everything internally was failing at a rapid rate and I had a temperature of 42 degrees so I was literally frying from
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the inside what's it supposed to be 36 37 is normal yeah um so with that so like literally my body's
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just been taken over by this virus um I swelled up to twice the size of me so I was kind of really unrecognizable I
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it just had ballooned out um so they put me all on the ventilators Etc and then one of the doctors just went
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away and just started researching he realized I was 36 years old he realized I had a young family he's like we need
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to do something so he rang around all the hospitals in New Zealand to ask what drugs they had used for meningococcal B
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case so I was miniature cocoa bee what does that mean it's the different variant of it so the most common is like
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the W which was up in Northland like there was a big mess they did a big vaccination program up there because it
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was taking over some of the schools but B was one they didn't have a vaccine for
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um and they have now created it from my records um but yeah so they so they ventilated me put me into a coma
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sort of said to my mum and dad and everyone that I would they protecting 48 to 72 hours that's it people that need
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to come and say goodbye need to come up also you were you were basically on life
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support um oh my God yeah yeah all right you don't remember any of us none of it at all I have no idea what
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the family what everyone else went through I can only imagine it's harrowing yeah it's harrowing yeah
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um just you're just just pausing pausing here before we move on it's such a
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I mean this or spoiler alert you survived you're here now on the boat there's so much to
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be thankful for like the I don't know the hunch or the Intuition or whatever
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it was from your ex to like get in touch with your mum like there's so much that
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did go right yeah otherwise you would have just died there in bed presumably I would have yeah a couple of hours later
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a couple of hours later yeah that 100 they said that that would have been the end
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um I would have been found because you hear about those stories don't you with
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people that have contracted managercocca and they've woken they haven't woken the
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next day um gone to bed thinking it's a cold or a flu and not woken up um and I think that was the difference
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with me is that I didn't have any of those other symptoms so all the other ones that they say is like you know the
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lights you know your eyes are painful with looking at light um the headaches the runny nose all
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those fever type things I never had that I just had the vomiting that was it yeah
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how do you how do you catch at it how can you avoid it so everyone carries it so everyone has it in the back of their
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throat and it's just so you could be a carrier and never pass it on um and never get sick yourself or you
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could be a carrier and pass it on and so saliva based obviously with being in the
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back of your throat and um it can be as simple as picking up someone else's cup or sharing a drink
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and you have left your saliva on there with the um disease and I've picked it up and
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it's taken over my body can be as easy as that young girls with lip gloss sharing that and that's why it was so
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um heavy and the young kids like little preschool children because they put everything in their mouth so it takes
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over all the time and then also teenagers in University hostels so for me to be 36 was a little bit out of the
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box and then after me there were quite several a lot of several cases of people in the same age bracket that we're
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getting it so it then kind of was discovered that it not necessarily is it in those two age groups anymore so what
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what can people do to avoid it is there anything in that that we can do don't
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share drinks okay don't just be really conscious about what you do so um my kids was drummed into them at a
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very young age not to share anything um you always tell your kids to share but don't do it this way
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um yeah so it's just it's just it's one of those things really you can't
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actually do a lot to prevent it yeah I mean yeah it just seems like it's a bad
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lack or a bad roll of the dice really doesn't it yeah yeah okay so so you're
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around your own life support and Intensive Care Unit at Palmerston North Hospital
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um your mum would have told you this I'm guessing did they come in and say goodbyes and things like that yeah so
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um they had to bring the kids up um and the kids were three and seven so they had to try and explain so Jade
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doesn't she was three she doesn't really remember a lot but I think Sam does more
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he was seven and of course I didn't look like mum because I'd swollen I was like
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filling the hospital bed and I just didn't look like me so I don't really
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no I don't I haven't even really asked how well that went because I don't
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really want to know because I can only imagine that it would have been heartbreaking yeah how old is your son
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now 20. he's 20. yeah yeah yeah do you ever talk about it or no you just yeah
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we do yeah we talk about it yeah we do talk about it over the years and they know exactly how lucky they are to have
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me still here um I suppose that makes it less triggering I mean if if that was his
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last vision of you it's the sort of thing that would give you PTSD yeah but the fact that you've um you survived it
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and you are thriving as you said before and you've an incredible role model for
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them I suppose yeah yeah it sort of takes away the sting of that hospital visit yeah that's it so
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um yeah so I don't really I don't think that I don't know how well that went but
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yeah then I just had like all my nearest and dearest obviously came in and um saw
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me um in the meantime the doctor that was ringing around the hospitals um came back to mum and dad with this
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drug and don't ask me what the name is because I can't remember um but it was really left field so one
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of my other friends Kelly um she was a nurse and so she was kind of the alongside mum and dad
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putting it into normal terms for them to try and understand what they're talking
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about so Kelly said is pretty random it's not a drug that they no one else had used it and it's not a drug that
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they would have um used normally but mum and dad said well it's worth a shot try anything
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right let's just do it so they shipped it in over the course of the weekend so
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this was a Thursday night I was admitted and so they started shipping it in on the Friday
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the doctor that shipped it in went on leave on the Saturday and Sunday and he didn't expect to see me on Monday that
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when he left on Friday he thought I wouldn't be there so they started administrating this drug
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and by the Sunday afternoon I did a teaspoon of wheeze which they all celebrated and was jumping around
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because that proved to them that my kidneys were starting to do something and so even though it was only a
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teaspoon but it was they even know were they like monitoring your everything else in your bladder and
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yeah right absolutely you're like honestly I was hooked up to so many machines it was yeah I've seen photos of
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it and um yeah I was there was no there wasn't much room for anything else I was jabbed everywhere yeah
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um so yeah so that indication of the teaspoon of wheeze was like okay we're heading in a good direction still
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obviously very critical I was still in a coma um so they just kept administrating it
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over the course of the next couple of weeks yeah um is I think it was about a month uh in a coma they decided that
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they would start to bring me out um I hadn't died so they were like okay let's bring her out and see what happens
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um because of all the internal organ organs failing so I was on dialysis for my kidneys
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um and then so that was going 24 7. um they didn't know how I was going to be
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because I didn't have any when people talked to me I would say things Way Way
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Back in the past but not in the present well this is when you just came out of the Cove yeah do you remember any of
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this now so I have some vivid experiences of coming out of a coma and I yeah it was it's horrific like they
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say hallucinations and it's seriously it's horrible um like what well there was I I remember
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this so there was um so they had started so over the course of three days they're
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bringing me out of this coma and they had to do it very slowly they thought that possibly I might be a little bit
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brain damaged because of the temperature that I had um fortunately I'm not but um
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so I guess heading towards the end of coming out um that's when the hallucination started
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and I just had this Vivid feeling that people were chasing me and they wanted to kill me and it was Vivid
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like so vivid and um to the point where an ICU you don't have to have this side of the beds up because
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patients generally aren't going to go anywhere when you're in ICU but these were so vivid the power of the
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mind at one point I literally I lifted my body attached to all of those machines and I threw myself on what I
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thought was a wheelchair so I knew that I couldn't walk but I threw myself onto
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a wheelchair thinking I could get away from this person that was chasing me might sound like a nutcase but it was
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seriously um is this is this the the drugs you're on or yeah it's the drugs are coming out
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of the coma yeah and you've got to get a hold of some of them yeah I know it was
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not pleasant let me tell you um and then I just I landed in a heap on the floor so of course everyone in ICU
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were like mortified they've never seen that happen before in their life that
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someone that was in a coma could do that um so then they had to pop me through the machines to make sure I hadn't broke
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working anything and now DSA at the ICU they have the side rails up now because well they
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changed the rules because yeah yeah um wow so yeah so that was horrific it was like not for how long how long do
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those hallucinations like forever yeah it felt like forever for me I don't know
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how long it actually was but it just felt horrendous um so when in my grogginess
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um you know I was saying really random things to family and stuff some some things made sense some things didn't so
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that's where they were really dicey about whether my brain was actually gonna function or not yeah
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um so I guess after a course of about a month um they were trying to because I needed
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dialysis and I also needed to have my legs looked at because I looked like I had frostbite
00:18:47
are you so you still had all your limbs at this point yeah yeah so I hadn't had
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any surgeries whatsoever because I wasn't well enough to to enjoy any ECGs so
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um yeah so you see frostbite and that's what I look like I was black like literally black all over
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um fortunately my face didn't get affected um but yeah fingers hands torso no torso
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was fine but my arms are all scarred Emma oh they are yeah and my legs what's
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this what's the scarring on those arms from so that's where the meningococcal
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ate away in my body yeah and so then also just like eats away at the flesh yep yeah so that's what the meningococcal
00:19:30
does and then of course when your organs fail you then go into septus and so then
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I went in to septicemia and that's when you that's when it starts to go gangrene
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looking and that's when your limbs become affected so yeah oh man that turn around happens
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really quickly yeah yeah yeah okay so um so is it is it obvious to you that you're going to lose the limbs or are
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you just not thinking about anything at that I didn't even read registered yeah
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like no it's been in a state of bewilderment so you don't know what's
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going on I hadn't had no idea what what had happened I had no idea how long I'd
00:20:05
been in hospital for um and I knew that I was sick but I didn't because I was pinned to the bed
00:20:12
by that I had no idea what what everything looked like um and so they were trying to so that I
00:20:20
needed dialysis and I needed to have basically my legs amputated and at that stage they were thinking they might be
00:20:28
able to just do my feet but it really depends how far they what they what they think of
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um and then um is that a decision that you make or is it a decision your mum makes on your
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behalf or the decision that the doctors make so that's just like not no choice
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in the matter it just has to be so they basically had to go up up my leg till they reached some decent amount of Flesh
00:20:53
skin you know everything that looked like would be able to be healed so I remember
00:21:00
them saying to me so so this went on for a while and then in the end I remember saying to the doctor look can we just
00:21:06
make a decision and get this thing going because I'm just like looking around
00:21:10
here um and what they were trying to do was they were trying to get me to be transferred to waikato hospital because
00:21:16
their dialysis and their Plastics unit Etc were all in within the one Hospital yeah but because I was in Palmerston I
00:21:25
had to go my region for that sort of thing was Wellington so I had to go to the lower Hutt Burns unit
00:21:32
and that meant I had to endure a trip into Wellington Central Hospital for the dialysis so it was in two separate
00:21:40
hospitals and it was horrendous um so they were trying to avoid that situation but they couldn't waikato
00:21:48
wouldn't take me so I had to go down so they flew me down to um lower Hutt in and they treated me
00:21:56
like a Burns patient so when you had Kelsey on the other week and I listened to her story about the burns and this is
00:22:04
Kelsey wear corn uh the white island Survivor yeah I resonated with her so much because the treatment that she had
00:22:11
was very similar to mine yeah obviously hers was a lot more over her body but um
00:22:17
it was the same kind of treatment so I was put into the burns unit and then I luckily
00:22:24
to my I'm so grateful I went there now at the time wasn't but now I'm so
00:22:30
grateful um because I ended up with Dr sweet tan who was a really excellent plastic
00:22:36
surgeon and he was able to he said to my mum I we might we'll try for the feet
00:22:43
but we'll just have to go up as far as we can but if we can do anything we would love to be able to save her knees
00:22:49
because as a bilateral amputee having these is going to make life so much easier for her
00:22:55
so so all this is happening in your blissfully unaware blissfully unaware yeah yeah which is probably a good thing
00:23:02
yeah it's interesting I mean yeah it's interesting there's two ways of looking
00:23:07
at it I guess because I I had a another remarkable woman on the podcast last year called Rachel Meyer who's um a para
00:23:13
climber and she had an accident um when she was kidding when she was a kid and broke some um bones in her foot and she
00:23:20
ended up opting to have um her leg removed as an adult so she went through the whole grieving process
00:23:26
of like fear Welling it and making this decision and coming to that decision but
00:23:30
that wasn't even an option for you no no option so that was more about survival
00:23:35
yeah so they had to get they had to do it to in order for me to live yeah that was where it was at yeah so they
00:23:44
um my literally my mum and like the family had to say goodbye to me again at that point because it was a 12-hour
00:23:52
surgery to do the amputations and they the state that I was in they didn't think I would come out of it
00:24:00
oh my God you're you're a poor parent I know oh my God we'll get to we'll get to
00:24:05
the the horrible stuff that you went through on the road to recovery afterwards I mean yeah but but meanwhile
00:24:11
you're blissfully unaware of all the that's going on your poor mother I know oh my God put it put them all
00:24:17
through yeah so much and I can't imagine what a role how long was this roller
00:24:22
coaster for that they were on oh she might make it she might not this is happening she might not make this yeah
00:24:28
so this was like four weeks down the track and then I was three weeks in Wellington while they did all the
00:24:35
surgeries um who's looking after the kids at this time just the year so they were all down
00:24:39
everyone was down in Wellington Jason had brought them um down as well so he was really awesome and supported
00:24:46
everybody in that way um and then yes I went into the surgery um Swede tan managed to basically patch
00:24:56
quilt my legs to be able to keep my so they were scripping around trying to find some skin so they
00:25:02
um had to take skin from all sorts of places to try and be able to do all my arms and my legs
00:25:09
with where the miniature cocoa would eat it in them away and then also try and amputate my legs and then
00:25:15
patch them up with skin so from a skin graft or yeah yeah so I got grafted from my back and my and my torso
00:25:24
um which was probably more painful than the other areas because it's like a graze and it's horrible
00:25:30
um but I owe my knees to him because he did whatever he could to save them and I'm so grateful for that because
00:25:37
having your knees is so much more functional than being above knee it's like a lot a lot lot harder
00:25:44
so then over the course of those three weeks I was in and out like so I would endure literally nearly two
00:25:52
surgeries a day while they were either checking my grafts to make sure they're
00:25:57
taking um or going in and doing the next lot and then in between times they would
00:26:03
come in at the in the morning at six in the morning to do my kidney readings and
00:26:07
if they were no good they would then put me on a in an ambulance and send me through to
00:26:14
Wellington hospital for my dialysis and so what they would have to do because I was like Kelsey where I couldn't be
00:26:22
touched like it hurt like it was painful I was sucking on the gas every time they
00:26:27
touched me moved me so to endure all the bumps on the road in an ambulance all the way to Wellington hospital was
00:26:34
horrific so they would drug me as much as they could to get there and then transport me over to the dialysis bed do
00:26:43
the dialysis which takes all those drugs out of your body and then I'd go home on nothing
00:26:49
and it was horrendous so I did that for um three weeks and that was it was not um not pleasant at all but fortunately
00:26:59
and I'm really grateful that the my internal organs are really good and they've all recovered and
00:27:06
um yeah that's that's been a huge thing yeah that's amazing so for those three
00:27:10
weeks you're you're fully conscious and aware of what's going on and you can you
00:27:15
remember the moment you got told about about the limbs yeah so actually my reaction to losing
00:27:21
my legs went wasn't that I was okay about that yeah like it didn't I think
00:27:25
that's the drugs you're on or probably just because you were so like like
00:27:29
beaten and deflated yeah yeah I think I was just I think I was just like oh my God I'm
00:27:35
alive for a start and then trying to process actually what had happened um but I was more surprised about my
00:27:43
arms and my fingers and I didn't but I don't know why that really confused me
00:27:48
as to why they needed to take them in um but when I see the photos of what they looked like I completely understand why
00:27:57
they had to because they were literally we were going to fall off otherwise yeah
00:28:00
because they were black so um but yeah that was probably more of a surprise and then Mum would obviously
00:28:08
fill me in a little bit little by little as to what happened and um so I could get my head around it
00:28:14
slowly um yeah so you're out of the woods at this stage yeah I would I I would say so
00:28:22
fortunately for me my graphs talk really well I never had to have any redone um and so I was really lucky in that in
00:28:30
that respect and they they think because I was cut into fitness beforehand that I
00:28:35
was reasonably healthy going in so they don't know whether that was a thing or
00:28:41
whether I'm just lucky um so yeah so over those three weeks I couldn't wait to get back to Palmerston
00:28:47
like I just was over Wellington um and I I guess I just I needed to go home like that's what I keep focusing on
00:28:56
I was like I just want to go home um after that so yeah so how long are we talking now for Hospital the time you
00:29:02
spending party plus the time you spent in yeah so we're up to a couple of months okay yeah no wonder you wanted to
00:29:08
get home yeah of course yeah so and like no one could come no one really came to
00:29:13
visit because I they weren't they couldn't because I was so acceptable to
00:29:17
bugs as well so they had to be very careful about who visited and and whatnot so I just had the same kind of
00:29:23
rotation of people coming um which was fine like and then when I got back to palmy I was able to see my
00:29:30
friends which was a big um positive step in the right direction but I wasn't released time I had to go
00:29:38
back to the palmy hospital and so once they got me all sorted as far as that's go then I went to the
00:29:46
rehabilitation ward in in palmy which was probably my worst part of the whole experience really why so
00:29:52
um because it's like 70 and 80 year olds that are in there and here I was at 36
00:29:57
some of the nurses were too scared to touch me like because of everything that was going on
00:30:04
um in the end the ICU nurses would cause I'm scared to touch you because you'd
00:30:08
yelping oh my grafting and yeah just like the the you know the skin changing and the scabs that were all over my body
00:30:17
and yeah they just didn't really know how to deal with that they hadn't seen anything
00:30:22
like it yeah yeah yeah it was a lot yeah when you get a um yeah Polytech in Palmerston to become a nurse You're not
00:30:29
expecting this no no no no and and thankfully I had made good friends with the people in the ICU unit and they
00:30:37
would come and visit me and um and they would make sure I was doing all right but it got to a point where I was over
00:30:44
it I was so over it and I just wanted to get out just frustrated yeah and um so my friend Kelly that was a nurse she
00:30:52
came and got me for the day I was allowed to go out on day leave so she came and got me and she took me back to
00:30:57
her house and I was in a wheelchair at that point so that was navigating trying to get in and out of cars Etc so this is
00:31:04
how long after the November when you got sick so we're talking um mid-January into January
00:31:12
so it's a Christmas that year yeah totally yeah yeah but you did get leagueless yeah I did so I shouldn't
00:31:20
make that joke you're the only one that should be able to make that no no you're
00:31:23
fine okay so I've heard it all before yeah so so we're up to mid-January now
00:31:27
and are you um so you're over it are you um up until this point like have you
00:31:32
have you been like like positive and optimistic or were you when you went in like a deep depression or anything no no
00:31:38
and they were expecting me to do that like I'd get the um people to come in and they were how are you doing I'm like
00:31:46
yeah I'm good and then but they were expecting me to say you know they're
00:31:50
like it's okay if you're not good and I'm like I'm no I'm okay and
00:31:55
um yeah they and it was almost like they were expecting me to to have something like some sort of reaction which is
00:32:02
probably quite normal yeah did that come at some point no no no where does this come from is this the is this just your
00:32:09
DNA is this what you were like beforehand and you you know you've always been like a just a tough
00:32:14
resilient person do you think I think I think I probably I am like I don't I mean regardless of how to happen how
00:32:23
resilient you are like no one ever faces a challenge like that until they have to
00:32:27
face yeah I know and you don't know how you're going to react exactly so yeah
00:32:33
um well that's lucky because that would have been yeah I was I was I was really
00:32:38
good um I think there was a there was a patch probably when I had left hospital and I
00:32:44
had started to go back to work etc there was a patch where I would get a little bit anxious about going into big
00:32:50
situations like big gatherings why because of people staring at you or yeah I don't know I think that might have
00:32:56
been it but I got I got over there that just didn't last for that long um but I do remember that little patch
00:33:03
yeah so at this point are you in a wheelchair yep yeah okay so you've just got like I'm imagining like bandaged
00:33:09
yeah so bandage stumps um and they were really swollen um because they take a while to you know
00:33:16
lose the fluid and stuff um and so yeah in a wheelchair so of course my left hand is not that good so
00:33:23
I just went around in circles in a wheelchair I was hopeless I couldn't Propel it at all
00:33:29
um so they're frustrated the hell out of me so frustrated yeah so you needed
00:33:34
someone to push you essentially pretty much so they end up getting me an electric chair because I couldn't do it
00:33:39
by myself I just literally I would have been useless in a wheelchair basketball team or a rugby team like it just was
00:33:46
never going to be a thing um and so yeah so uh Kelly came and got me that day I went back to her house and
00:33:54
I said to her I don't want to go back and she's like I'll ring them and you
00:33:58
can stay the night here and she said we're nurses we've you know we know what
00:34:02
we're doing so she rung them and they said yeah that's fine she needs to be
00:34:05
about the next day so um Kelly had made a big bath and they'd managed to get me
00:34:10
into the bath and I did normal things and it was like oh this is amazing you know like and I had a nice sleep in a
00:34:16
nice big bed and it was just lovely um so the next day when I woke I said to Kelly I'm out I'm not going back
00:34:23
and she's like well we'll have to go back to get you out and I was like yeah
00:34:27
okay so we pulled up to the rehab board and we just started packing up my room and the nurses come in and go over
00:34:35
what's happening and I'm out I'm leaving and they're like well and like they were trying to get
00:34:40
their heads around and I'm like I've had enough I just need to go home and um and
00:34:45
so they said to me well if you discharge yourself then um you know if you need some more
00:34:53
medical assistance in the future you won't be able to come back to the hospital because you discharge yourself
00:34:58
and I was like man that's weird so you're all in or you're all out yeah
00:35:03
yeah yeah and so okay yeah Kelly being a nurse basically that's a load of yeah fake news yeah and uh so
00:35:10
we packed up and and off we win and like from that point on I never looked back um
00:35:16
but at that before I had done that so probably going back a two weeks before we had this meeting with all the doctors
00:35:24
and all the physios and all everybody there's a big room full of everyone and
00:35:27
it was me and Mum and so they sort of gave me my diagnosis at that point so they said to me that I would likely be
00:35:36
in hospital for 12 months so we're at three months at this point so I'd likely be there for 12 months
00:35:43
um I probably wouldn't walk again because of the scarring on my legs they wouldn't cope with the Prosthetics
00:35:51
and probably unlikely to go back to work and I was thinking well that's awesome
00:35:56
yeah how does that conversation go down yeah you mentioned before you were physically active and physical person
00:36:02
prior to this um yeah what's that moment like yeah you told you're not going to walk again yeah
00:36:08
so I think at the time I was like looking at them as if to say are you serious so is the room just spinning or
00:36:13
yeah I was just like trying to absorb what they were saying and I was you burst into tears or what no I didn't I
00:36:19
went the other way I went and I'll prove it right I'll prove you wrong don't
00:36:23
with Penny yeah I literally and I said to mum that's not going to be my story
00:36:27
and I said no there's no way that I'm gonna I said what is the point in surviving if I can't do the things that
00:36:35
I want to do like I'm here I've got two young kids the choice I need to make is
00:36:41
that I've got to live and I've got to find my new normal and be able to make
00:36:45
that work for the best way that I can for me and for them and I was definitely not going to be in hospital for 12
00:36:52
months and I definitely was going to walk again and there was just no way and for my own mental state going back to
00:36:59
work was the best thing that I could have ever done yeah how long was that that was quite so nice six months yeah
00:37:05
six months later so you went back to the same job yeah how was how was that so I
00:37:09
was so super lucky um what were you doing by the way I was working for user bus in Palmerston North
00:37:15
the bus company and um Justin Allen was the managing director um installers um and they were amazing so the building
00:37:25
wasn't set up for a wheelchair so they took down walls they um moved shelves they had a bell in the
00:37:33
toilet in case I fell off the toilet when I transferred from the from the um wheelchair to the toilet like the girls
00:37:40
in the office went well over their job description and helping me um so they made my transition so easy
00:37:46
and they just made it work and I turned up when I could turn up and I left when I was tired fatigued yeah yeah there was
00:37:55
a lot going on with your body still at this point yeah yeah so um initially Justin thought I had set me up at home
00:38:01
and then he had a change of heart and said actually if you come into the office at least you're with people and
00:38:07
it's um and it was the best decision yeah it was in by by sort of two in the
00:38:13
afternoon they could see that the drugs that I was still on were starting to wear and and so they would they would
00:38:19
just call my Mobility taxi and come and get me Chuck me in there in a way I'd go
00:38:24
home and sleep for the afternoon what drugs like pain relief or yeah yeah yeah you want anything now or no no no wow
00:38:31
that's amazing yeah should that's good yeah do you just put that down to
00:38:35
determination leather speedy recovery and just getting back to trying to figure out what your new
00:38:41
normal is yeah I'm pretty tunnel vision like I do and I do yeah I guess part of me was it was the
00:38:49
drive was having young kids yeah you know and and wanting to be a a mum that was still fully involved
00:38:56
um and then I saw it's heaps to live for so I was like you know I'm still alive I've got a
00:39:03
I can either I the way I said it to myself I've got two choices I could certainly feel sorry for myself and kind
00:39:08
of that be it or go get go find what my new normal is and and go go and go and take on any challenge that came
00:39:18
along and that's literally what I did and if I couldn't work it out I'd figure
00:39:22
a way how to work it out oh how this is this is so cool for your kids what a good role model yeah they think I'm a
00:39:29
tough mum however you are you're a badass yes and I'm just thinking if I was a double I
00:39:36
think I'm a people pleaser by Nature I'll be the worst dog I'd be like no you
00:39:39
you'll be fine you'll walk your legs will probably grow back even that's what
00:39:43
I would say I'd probably like I over install confidence in people so so we're
00:39:47
uh so it's so you you have got prosthetic legs now yeah um and you live a very active life this is how I
00:39:53
discovered you through your Instagram account fitness app amputee which we'll
00:39:56
get to um so how did how did the leg thing come about after you got told you wouldn't
00:40:00
walk again yeah so um about so after that meeting I went down to the Wellington limb Center
00:40:06
because it was the local one and they they looked at my legs and they were in a narrowing and thinking what what are
00:40:12
we going to do with these um because of the scarring where were they cut like uh just below the knee
00:40:17
yeah so I don't know how far down um but the scarring was the problem because traditionally with sockets
00:40:25
you've got like a liner on like a rubber liner in the friction when you walk
00:40:29
because you're literally walking in like buckets so you're just like sitting in
00:40:33
it and so the friction is quite a lot and they thought my skin would break down all the time which it did
00:40:41
um so they end up getting thicker liners and I kind of got by with that but I watched like a robot like I literally
00:40:48
wobbled from side to side and it was it was like a 1970s robot yeah and it was hard like it was hard work it was
00:40:56
exhausting um in yeah that whole transition was hard but I did it for six years like
00:41:02
that um and then I discovered that my I was getting new sockets made all the time
00:41:08
because my legs just lose volume over there so you wake up in the morning where you've been lying horizontal all
00:41:13
night when you stand up your legs are a lot bigger but by the afternoon of walking on them all day mine were shrink
00:41:21
like enormously so I was forever getting new leaks made and I was getting really
00:41:25
frustrated with the system down there um at one point they said to me oh there's not much else we can do so you
00:41:31
can either have those legs or you can go back into a wheelchair and so that kind
00:41:36
of for someone like me to say that it was like not received well yeah um and so then I started looking around
00:41:44
and I looked over in Aussie and I went to Australia looking at well I went to a like a Expo and I was
00:41:54
thinking that I was more looking for the feet thing to give me more flexibility when I walked rather than being a robot
00:42:00
because my knees and hips were getting sore because I wasn't walking normally
00:42:06
um so that's what I my intentions were was to go and find some sort of better
00:42:11
feet option when I got there I was looking around and I was talking to one of the brands
00:42:17
you know to people and he said to me or you should go next door and listen to the surgeon that's speaking about Osteo
00:42:25
integration and I said I can't have Osteo integration because I'm baloney
00:42:29
and he goes you're a kiwi and I am and he goes That's because you they don't
00:42:34
know in New Zealand that you that it is an option and I was like oh okay and so I win and by the way just pausing you
00:42:42
there that seems absurd yeah that you can be a three-hour flight away and there are yeah anyway yeah yeah that's
00:42:48
an eye roll moment yeah it is an eye roll moment and I always felt like the um limb centers it was like a secret
00:42:54
society almost like they didn't give you too much information about stuff and
00:42:58
I've learned so much more about Prosthetics with having my connections in Australia since
00:43:05
um so I went and sat in and listened so it was with um Professor mongodel Medeiros are you a
00:43:14
big fan of his work he's an incredible guy yeah yeah I bet um so he's got a story of his own he's a
00:43:21
refugee from Iraq and came out on the boats and so he's got his own book Etc
00:43:26
all about that anyway he was an orthopedic surgeon and he always wanted to give back to and
00:43:33
make lives easier for amputees so he remembers watching the Terminator as a kid and thought I could do that for
00:43:43
amputees and it has been around for many many years like in Sweden and Germany but they hadn't quite perfected it the
00:43:51
way munjid has now um and so I was listening to him he was talking about baloney I was like this is
00:43:59
okay this is positive I'm liking this and weirdly after he finished speaking
00:44:05
he came and sat next to me so it was like it was meant to be and um I said to him
00:44:12
so you do do below knee and he goes yep he goes That's what I just said because
00:44:17
he's got that kind of manner and I was like okay and he goes you're a kiwi and
00:44:22
I went yeah he goes are you interested and I said yeah I am he goes when do you go home and I see Tuesday and he goes
00:44:27
come and see me tomorrow so this was a Sunday so I um and then the lunch break has
00:44:35
um off-site a Belinda came and sat with me and her auntie had died of meningococcal so she kind of resonated
00:44:41
with my story and um so anyway I went out the next day he did all the tests on me bone density
00:44:48
scans just to make sure that I had strong enough bones for it um told me the whopping price
00:44:58
and basically what I needed to do so I needed to go back I needed to go back to one of his clinics have some
00:45:05
psychological testing to make sure that I was okay that I was an amputee that I was going to be okay with a piece of
00:45:11
metal hanging out my leg oh really what is it like a counseling session or is it
00:45:15
a quick questionnaire what is it uh it's a one-on-one right with a psychologist
00:45:19
and they just ask you random questions about about your life how it happened um what you do currently so they're
00:45:27
trying to assess whether you're hiding away from The Real World or whether you're still out there being involved
00:45:33
um so I passed there obviously I was did you have to think about the answers like
00:45:38
were you thinking what would be the correct thing to say here you just answered I just answered honestly yeah
00:45:42
I'm in then yeah and I met a couple of um amputees there so I could see the product I could see how they were
00:45:51
walking what they were doing and it blew my mind I was like this is amazing um so it's it is
00:45:58
really amazing technology so that it's literally it's a titanium rod that is
00:46:04
implanted into the tibia bone for me or the femur for above um through surgical procedures my rehab
00:46:13
was two years letting the bone and the implant integrate into each other which is a slow process so what does that two
00:46:21
years look like so that was wheelchair so you go right back to the ground Groundhog Day so you have to have your
00:46:27
head back in that space so back to a wheelchair then once that was kind of around a month and then I was up on legs
00:46:37
with two crutches taking most of the weight so and then once you got through that then you dropped one crutch and
00:46:45
then you're loading like about 20 and then you move forward to no crutches and then you just start walking not
00:46:55
overdoing it how's that in the beginning is it what's as the balance once
00:46:58
difficult or is it painful on the on the stumps or the bones weirdly it's not
00:47:05
painful you would think it would be but it's not if it it looks painful like you
00:47:09
you lifted up your actually do you want to lift up your leg now so we can see it
00:47:12
on only if you want to I don't mind um it looks painful looks like it should
00:47:17
be painful but it's not painful at all no not at all um just for the people that are watching
00:47:23
this on YouTube for anyone that's um listening to the audio version you won't
00:47:26
see this so that's that stays on by the way cool New Balance shoes aren't they
00:47:31
cool yeah so what bit comes off so so this part closest to my leg Yeah is in me permanently and there as an using Allen
00:47:42
key and I take from there off down so when you go to bed at night what do you some people leave them on yeah I don't I
00:47:49
take my legs off yeah you've never had a thing where you've woken up and you've forgotten and
00:47:54
tried to get it no no no no no no that is amazing technology isn't it it's
00:48:01
incredible yeah um but the the coolest thing about it is that for me because I was only an
00:48:07
amputee six months six years before having the surgery it's reconnected all my wires and so I can feel the ground
00:48:15
the concrete the grass yeah how yeah that's amazing holy that's incredible yeah and that's
00:48:24
something they didn't know was going to happen with the surgery and it's just
00:48:27
over the um time so if you were born an amputee like you know you don't have
00:48:33
that connection yeah so that doesn't happen but the the least time that you have been in a socket before you go to
00:48:40
Osteo integration generally people are feeling yeah the differences and and what about
00:48:46
Phantom pains can't get it I've been fortunate I I I've been really fortunate I did have it
00:48:52
right at the very beginning and it's excruciating and horrible um but yeah I'm really I'm one of the
00:48:59
really lucky ones I do take magnesium and I'm religious with magnesium um and I have done it from as soon as I
00:49:07
got the surgery monget said start taking magnesium and I take it religiously every night and I don't know whether
00:49:13
that helps um or not but I've always been really active so I don't know I just some
00:49:20
people it's really horrible but I am I've been lucky that that hasn't
00:49:24
affected me yeah you're remarkable aren't you you you really are like meningitis
00:49:31
picked the wrong person yeah I know it really did it shut your teeth I suppose times like this you find out just how
00:49:36
tough you are yeah yeah people say that like they always say you know you're one strong lady or whatever and
00:49:44
it's like yeah I guess I am I don't really think about it I just do what I
00:49:48
want to do and make sure that I'm doing it the best way that I can and having
00:49:53
this surgery so while having to go all the way back so I did have to learn to walk again because the wobbling that I
00:50:00
was doing in the sockets wasn't how this was going to work with the implant so
00:50:05
the implant is aligned like laser aligned so that you're completely 100 in line with your legs and um so I had to
00:50:14
learn I had to go right back to the beginning and I lost that thought I had to say it to be like a 36 37 year old
00:50:21
learning to walk again yeah it was weird like it was rewarding because I was taking my first steps again in this new
00:50:28
system frustrating as well because I just wanted to go um and I had to be patient I'm not the
00:50:35
most patient person in the world um and being patient I had to learn that really a lot because I had to wait for a
00:50:43
few years before I could actually start doing what I could really wanted to do um which was like exercise yeah yeah and
00:50:52
just keeping up with day-to-day life like you know like generally in a socket I would if I was invited somewhere I
00:50:58
would have to think about the access I would have to think about how I was going to get in and out
00:51:04
um was the ground going to be slippery was it you know all those things would run through my head in preparation of
00:51:10
going anywhere now I don't even think about it I just do it I can walk up the
00:51:14
hills in Wellington I can I just do life like to the fullest and I can keep up with all my family my
00:51:22
friends um yeah how much was that operation you said you said what you want to go there
00:51:29
and I just remembered you said before it cost a ton of money not covered by any sort of insurance or
00:51:36
no did you set up a give a little or anything like that I did um we did do some crowdfunding and that that
00:51:42
definitely helped um if you don't if you don't want to answer you don't have to answer but well
00:51:47
it's a it's a really good size deposit on a house oh my God yeah yeah but necessary for you the quality
00:51:55
of life you've got I'd never go back like money well spent yeah it was money
00:51:59
well spent and I was really fortunate like manger was really very very giving for me because I was as
00:52:07
first kiwi and first miniature cockle patient um he kind of gave me a pretty discounted rate so he contributed a lot
00:52:15
to to my surgery as well so I was really super lucky with that then some crowdfunding and then
00:52:25
um yeah paid the rest lived on spaghetti for a while um but yeah so we got there in the end
00:52:32
um and I'm I for quality of life it's it's money well spent I would never not
00:52:37
have it now it's not for everybody for sure um and it seems to be that people that
00:52:43
have are not healthy on the inside don't always respond that well to Osteo integration so
00:52:49
um yeah you've kind of gotta you have to keep yourself healthy yeah I mean we've established that you're
00:52:56
strong and you're resilient and and very very tough but there must have been some
00:53:01
like just I don't know awful days or awful moments we just frustration gets the better of
00:53:07
you yeah they generally happened at the limb Center just out of frustration yeah it was
00:53:13
really frustrating and that whole socket journey I hated I really did it was I found it really restricting
00:53:19
[Music] um and super frustrating and that was probably yeah that was that was tough
00:53:26
because it just it didn't work for me um and my quality of life was nowhere near what it is now with those sockets
00:53:36
um and yeah I guess there were times you know like when the kids were going on school camp and things like that and I
00:53:44
would have loved to have been a peer and help but physically that wasn't something I could do at that time so
00:53:50
yeah I had to kind of suck those kind of situations up and just just feel sorry for yourself for a brief period of time
00:53:58
out of it yeah yeah yeah I don't tend to tend to dwell on it I like I just want to enjoy the
00:54:06
light I've got yeah how how can other people um take some of that take some of that
00:54:11
magic juice like what would you what would you message me or like you know maybe it's just part of your your DNA
00:54:18
and and who you are and your personality but there's got to be takeaways for
00:54:22
other people that you know go through about how they can deal with it and make them make the best of a bad
00:54:27
situation what do you reckon yeah yeah what's your advice oh I don't know
00:54:34
um I don't know I guess like on one side you've got to want to do it but you've
00:54:40
you really you have to dig deep like I had to dig deep so many times to push you to get keep going
00:54:48
um so yeah you gotta you gotta want to do it and just never give up like I don't give up
00:54:54
I just if I can't do something I'll figure out a way how to do it or if it's
00:54:58
not quite now it's something I can work towards in the future to make that happen so there were plenty of over the
00:55:06
seven years there was plenty of those kind of situations where I can't quite
00:55:11
do that now but then in a year's time I could do it if I just keep chipping away
00:55:17
um keeping healthy is is a big thing like what you Feed and Fuel your body is just so much
00:55:24
helps with everyday life I reckon yeah was that was that a Cornerstone of your life before the meningitis not not as
00:55:32
much as a focus like I've have a lot like I eat and drink a lot of protein um and that's because it feeds my bones
00:55:41
and helps with my legs so um I have a really quite a high protein diet and water I just drink an enormous
00:55:51
amount of it because I need to keep flushing my kidneys and keep all those internal organs ticking over so
00:55:58
um it's quite a focus for me yeah I drink a lot of water as well but I'll
00:56:02
tell you what I'm not I'm urinating just a teaspoon of wheat there's a lot more
00:56:06
than that coming out more frequently as well yeah me too now yeah yeah so the um
00:56:10
the Instagram account um the fitness amputee by the way you should have way more followers than what
00:56:15
you do have it seems astonishing to me because it you know you're remarkable
00:56:20
and it's inspiring and all these and motivating so it should have more so hopefully we can boost that up a little
00:56:26
bit but when when did Jesus decide to do that and set that up and sort of become your
00:56:30
public I guess with your like recovery and your progress and your journey yeah I guess
00:56:36
um so once I'd gone through the rehab and I was coming out the other side that's
00:56:42
when when generally walking was becoming easy and I could walk a distance and not
00:56:48
you know have any inkling of any pain or anything like that like a pain in the sense that I've overdone it so once that
00:56:55
was becoming normal that's when I thought so I got a bike like just an exercise bike because
00:57:04
I used to do spin classes and that was my favorite thing and I thought maybe I could try that biking's not putting too
00:57:10
much pressure on my implant Etc yep so I started biking and then it kind of just grew from there
00:57:17
um and I did I did my first challenge like a fitness challenge with Shane Hunter and Palmerston North who is a
00:57:27
bodybuilder and he did this Challenge on a on a um just as a for his friends and
00:57:33
family really and so I did that and I was surprised at what I could do and by no means what I was I doing what I'm
00:57:42
doing now but it was my start of of that whole journey and then I really enjoyed
00:57:50
the challenge I spent so I liked that period of time and having because I'm kind of driven by time like with
00:57:58
you know um an eight-week challenge is like okay I've got eight weeks to do this and see
00:58:04
the improvements along the way and I started videoing myself because I could see what I was doing then and it was
00:58:09
more for my own benefit it was like oh god what the hell are you doing there like that looks really odd well you know
00:58:15
you need to do this better or whatever um and so after that challenger'd finish
00:58:22
I went looking for the next challenge and I signed up with these girls from Australia it was called move with us and
00:58:28
I was with them for three years and became one of their ambassadors because they were Amazed by what I could do too
00:58:35
and so I was just starting again with challenges I literally just for three years went from challenge to challenge
00:58:41
all different ones some were Pilates some were like glute work some was all over I was just depending what they what
00:58:49
was happening and I loved it and I just started connecting with other people um one of my friends in Australia who's
00:58:55
also an amputee Linda she does them too so her and I were like kind of Sidekicks
00:59:01
together doing it um and then recently so where I got quite a bit of my growth was with a girl in
00:59:11
Hamilton which was Elevate and it was with Nick and she I saw the most amount of growth in my time with her eight-week
00:59:22
Challenge and she she knew my limitations and also would try and tweak the program a little
00:59:31
bit for me but yeah I grew so much strength in that eight weeks to now feeling like I'm stronger than I was
00:59:41
before yeah yeah yeah um which leads me to this question which is um probably a very I don't know if
00:59:50
it's an inappropriate question it's probably a very difficult one to answer
00:59:52
but if you could go back to 2009 and choose to have the the meningitis and everything
00:59:59
that's come or not have it Baron made all the bad stuff that's happened all
01:00:02
the good stuff that's happened as well um would you change it would you change
01:00:06
anything um probably I think the reason I get emotional when I talk about it is because of what everyone else went
01:00:15
through not necessarily what I went through and so when I think about that time way back it's about
01:00:22
um my mum and my dad and you know the kids and all that and even what everyone went through and that's what makes me
01:00:29
emotional more than what I went through like I just think God it must have been heart-wrenching for them to sit there
01:00:35
and see that happening um but as far as your question goes I think it's made me the person I am now
01:00:41
and the journey I look at life so differently yeah and it's such an unselfish answer yeah and I just I don't
01:00:50
know I kind of seize the moment now like we're I don't often say no to things
01:00:55
like I I like to do stuff with people um and I just look at I just look at life differently and I just think you
01:01:04
know let's do it why not so yeah yeah just reflect on that period like you you just can't imagine have you
01:01:12
I'm guessing you've had numerous conversations with your mum or your parents about it that must have been
01:01:16
just um stuff of nightmares I know it's that period yeah are you a blissfully out of
01:01:22
it you were on morphine or whatever yeah I was I was asleep I had no idea what they were going through I know like my
01:01:28
mum and my brother and all of them like they literally took over the waiting room in ICU and they they slept there
01:01:33
for days on end um because they just never knew like mum said she just couldn't leave me like
01:01:39
because she didn't know if I was gonna still be there the next day so she just
01:01:43
couldn't take herself away so it would have um oh it would have been horrendous and
01:01:49
then and then this other admin to deal with like the you know the coming up with the narrative that they're going to
01:01:54
tell the kids um you know because you can't feed the kids too much information
01:01:57
and you no yeah man yeah so it's yeah it's and it's interesting but yeah I I
01:02:05
it has definitely shaped who I am and um I it is what it is for me now and I don't hide my legs like in the in the
01:02:16
summertime I wear shorts everybody says um at me and I'm just used to just blocking it out
01:02:23
um kids are hilarious because they're like oh no filter you're a robot it's kind of cool yeah
01:02:30
um how long was it um that you were I mean you came in here today we're wearing long pants and you
01:02:36
you don't walk like a robot you just walk normally so there's no way of knowing but
01:02:40
um your hands are definitely messed up yeah how how long were you self-conscious of them did you find
01:02:44
yourself sort of tucking them under your armpits especially still do that do you
01:02:48
yeah I think I still do that with my hands can you just sense people staring or you fear they're gonna steer or yeah
01:02:55
I think it's become a real Habit to pop my left hand in my pocket majority of
01:03:00
the time or under my arm um I don't know I just think it's become a thing yeah with it and now I do it
01:03:07
without even realizing I'm doing it um but when I'm at work like I'm typing
01:03:11
away and I can type and carry on like it's not I'm not limited in that regard
01:03:17
um but it's yeah I don't know it's just something I do tuck away but with my
01:03:23
legs I'm just like whatever yeah yeah and have you had any therapy or counseling over the years or just those
01:03:29
sessions before you had the operation yeah yeah that's it that's it man you're
01:03:34
a tough guy and I Jesus when you think about it now isn't it like you know I
01:03:39
don't know I suppose with you with your kids you're just mum so maybe it's not
01:03:43
not a sort of conversation that you really have but have you sat down with them and you know like talked about
01:03:48
things in sort of depth or detail yeah they they know everything yeah they know how it was they know that I you know
01:03:55
nearly died um are they at an age now where they can sort of like appreciate just how
01:04:00
remarkable you are well not really you're just mum you're a pain in the ass
01:04:07
they don't I mean like Jade was three and Sam was seven so that majority of their life I've been this way yeah so
01:04:16
um they don't yeah they don't it just doesn't and all of their friends that
01:04:20
come and go at home they all know the story um they they just accept me for who I am
01:04:26
and yeah it's never it's just never a problem oh no I don't mean like that I
01:04:32
just I I'm thinking from a point of being an ore of you as their as their mum and I feel like as they maybe as
01:04:38
they get older and they get a bit more um you know aware of the world around them and things they'll become more like
01:04:46
more more of a fan of you I guess than what you've done and hopefully like listening to a conversation like this
01:04:51
will make them realize like you've been through a lot and you've done it with a
01:04:54
smile on your face and you've grit your teeth and yeah you know you haven't you
01:04:58
you know you haven't given up on yourself or on them no it's it's cool
01:05:02
yeah and I guess they're probably the driving force too because you know like
01:05:06
they they we had to adapt and learn from a young age how to replay you know spend
01:05:13
time with them because I couldn't get down on the floor with them so we would
01:05:17
have little tables and we'd work cat different things that we could do as opposed to running outside and you know
01:05:22
mucking around because it wasn't something I could do so we just re-learned what we could do together at
01:05:28
those times and then they've just grown with me at each stage that I've gone and
01:05:33
now they don't even they don't see it they don't see that I'm an amputee
01:05:37
because it just is what it is and yeah they don't and when people say to them
01:05:42
is your mum an amputee they're like oh yeah and that's all they say yeah but I
01:05:46
suppose there's there's nothing that you can't do though there isn't now yeah no
01:05:50
now there's no I don't have any limitations at all um yeah so I just so they they don't see
01:05:58
there either um of anything they always laugh and say that when they're sick
01:06:04
they're not sick in my eyes because they're not really that sick and they're
01:06:08
like man you're so tough like you know yeah they are they the same as your or
01:06:13
like are they are they quite um quite tough cookies I've had to make them that
01:06:16
way in some ways because I don't let them have days off school that was in the 1980s it was different
01:06:25
back then yeah yeah so I remember Jade and she still remembers it like her toe she had a sore toe and she kept going on
01:06:32
about and I'm like you'll be right you'll be right it must be nice to have
01:06:35
toes yeah and then a week later it's like fully infected and it's like okay
01:06:39
we better go to the doctor and she's like geez mum I'm like I'm sorry like
01:06:43
you know I should have listened more it's not that bad it could be worse it could be worse yeah yeah so they've kind
01:06:50
of had to suck it up a lot so yeah I guess they are probably quite tough cookies and in a lot of ways yeah yeah
01:06:57
oh good stuff and and um how long how long was it after um losing the limbs that you that you
01:07:03
dreamed yourself without limbs does that make sense I've had um I've had numerous um numerous people on the
01:07:12
podcast um Rachel wine and Liam alone couple of amputees and uh Brett smailer and
01:07:17
another guy called um Kerry Suter who um went from being able able-bodied to being you know quadriplegics overnight
01:07:23
and there's a theory that um that when you start dreaming yourself as an amputee as and how you are that's
01:07:32
when you've truly come to accept it no okay haven't heard that before haven't you no
01:07:37
yeah no secret society they don't tell you the story there you go yeah um I don't know I don't know if I've ever
01:07:46
had that thought yeah it's just yeah I mean sometimes I still get that that's like and you
01:07:57
it's weird what you what the brain does like I might have an itchy toe and I reach
01:08:03
down to scratch my tone it's not even there but you have that sensation like
01:08:07
that happens a lot that's kind of like that Phantom thing yeah yeah so you can feel like the other
01:08:15
day I walked to work in the rain and I felt like my feet were wet all day and they probably were but I shouldn't
01:08:21
be able to feel that but I could that's so interesting yeah yeah so how old are you now what
01:08:28
are you 14 49 50. come on well 51 no 48 49 49. it's that big one this year oh is
01:08:36
it what are you doing I don't know not accepting that very well oh really no why I don't really want to turn 50.
01:08:44
oh come on grow up what do you already have yeah and I I must admit I'd have a
01:08:50
big party I just had like a quiet dinner party dinner party I was like I just want to let it go but um it should be
01:08:54
something that's celebrated yeah I know especially with what you've been through
01:08:57
yeah yeah yeah and the second half of your life How's that gonna look what do
01:09:00
you want to do what do you want to achieve um at the moment I am working um so I'm a contractor so kind of
01:09:10
working for myself and and lots of ways but I'm working for stats New Zealand in
01:09:16
the payroll team so that's been my bread and butter literally his payroll um so I'm pretty busy in there at the
01:09:23
moment um I'd love to work with amputees at some stage just to show them that what is possible and what
01:09:34
you can do whether that is alongside at some point or or what I have no idea what that
01:09:42
would be but that is something that irks away at me about I'd love to be able to
01:09:47
do something along those lines just to help others carry on with your life when something
01:09:54
like this has happened um yeah and literally yeah just that other half isn't it from 50 the other half of
01:10:03
your life well I recorded a podcast this morning with um with a guy called Arch jelly who used to be the coach of um
01:10:09
John Walker and he's he turns 101 in a couple of months wow and he's fit and
01:10:14
he's healthy and he's vibrant and he's he's uh mentally sharp yeah so yeah you
01:10:20
and I we shouldn't be winding down the clock we should be just getting started
01:10:23
yeah that's it yeah and I do look at it like that too like I just think I've got
01:10:27
heaps to do you know there's heaps of life left to live isn't there and I'm
01:10:31
lucky I'm still here so and I'm healthy so you know I can do whatever really 100 100 you should be
01:10:41
getting your story out there as much as what you can because you're um oh how do
01:10:44
you feel being called inspiring does it sit comfortably with you or some people feel real weird about it it
01:10:50
is a bit weird because you don't really um myself like that yeah but I suppose you
01:10:55
can you've been through a big thing and no one knows how they're going to react
01:10:58
until they're they're faced with that big thing yeah and you've um you've
01:11:01
faced it with uh courage and Grace and dignity yeah yeah I think I think that makes you inspiring yeah yeah people do
01:11:09
use that a lot yeah and and strong is the other words that they use a lot but um yeah I guess my kids are or Sam's 20
01:11:18
he's about to head off overseas um in Jade 17 so she's only got one more
01:11:23
year left at work at school so they're about to I'm probably more unhappy about
01:11:28
that yeah they're starting to go off and live their own lives and it's like oh
01:11:33
you don't need me anymore yeah yeah yeah yeah it kind of that's a bit sad that's
01:11:38
kind of yeah that's I suppose that's just in its own sort of way a sense of
01:11:41
loss yeah it's weird like yeah it is it is kind of it's like oh it's all
01:11:45
happening at once and I'm turning 50 at the same time all right come on you've
01:11:49
survived meningitis you can survive this you've got this I believe in you hey
01:11:53
Penny Taylor thank you so much for coming on the podcast and sharing your story sorry no problem I really
01:11:57
appreciate it and really nice to reconnect again I know funny isn't it it's a small world it really is
01:12:03
[Music] thank you