My Story

There I was in the 90’s living the dream! Cruising the beautiful waters of the Great Barrier Reef enjoying my life as a liveaboard yachtie.

To replenish the sailing kitty I took an admin position with a general aviation company, Falcon Airlines, based in Cairns. In Nov ’96 the

airline owner asked me to fly to our Horn Island office in the Torres Straits.

My world literally took plunge.....

On the return flight to Cairns we flew a twin jet turbo Piper Cherokee aircraft (that the pilots referred to as “Old Smokey” ).

Anyway…..the plane had a couple of mishaps enroute resulting in only one engine working….until it didn’t!

Long story short; the plane never made it back to Cairns instead we ditched into the ocean below us, 22 nm north of Palm Cove, FNQ.

As we hurtled to the water below my mind raced to recall the brace position (I wished I paid attention when the air hosty gave the safety spiel!!)

As I was deciding on what brace position to die in, the passenger behind me undid his safety belt, becoming flying missile, forcibly slamming into my body .

The force was so great I thought I had broken my neck “Great!” I told myself “so if I survive I’ll be a paraplegic”. Morbid I Know!

Onboard the plane was myself, my then partner, the pilot & his wife and a passenger we had picked up from Bamaga Island. Remarkably the plane

scudded along the ocean floor, popped up briefly, allowing us to exit the craft (my partner had kept the door of the plane ajar upon descent).

My partner reached for me first, dragging me onto the submerged wing of the plane, urging me to get into the water before the plane went back down. I refused!!

I knew this area we went down in was known as “Shark Alley”. We had sailed around this area and it was known as the spot where trawler fisherman would

empty their ocean bycatch before entering the Port of Cairns. Lots of burley & bloody bits....I didn’t see the point of surviving a plane crash only to be taken by a shark!!

With me refusing to get out of the way ,the remaining passengers were pulled out across my straddled legs still clinging to the wing of the plane.

(Resulting in a full tear to my sartorius thigh muscle). Just before impact the pilot had managed to issue a ‘MayDay’ call which gave us a glimmer of hope of being rescued.

It was now dark, our Islander passenger couldn’t swim and we thought we had lost the pilot’s wife as she was nowhere to be seen. We tried to swim / float towards

a distant light we could see on the shore. Hours later we were rescued by the Cairns based rescue chopper.

During the rescue mission I sustained further injuries when the cable rope became entangled with me and another passenger who was being winched up.

(resulting in damage to my groin muscle and other pelvic ligaments). Following on from this life altering event I experienced feelings of:

Ongoing chronic pain
Nerve pain & numbness
Stress
Frustration
Anxiety.…then finally
Depression
P.T.S.D.

I desperately wanted my old life back.....no one can really prepare you with how you move forward after experiencing a traumatic event.

Or how to deal with excruciating neck pain & back pain, constant headaches & migraines, numbness, sciatica, hip pain and general misery!

I decided I wanted more from life than to spend the rest of my days in this debilitating condition.

So I created a recovery regime for myself. I began daily strengthening exercises based on yoga poses and aerobic movements that I used

to do when I was feeling fit & fabulous.

Focusing my attention on the major pain points, I worked out strategic methods to release, strengthen then realign my body.

As different areas of my body repaired I noticed how that would affect the way I walked, my posture, sleeping position and daily activities.

Moving forwards on my recovery journey I was always on the lookout for practitioners who would share their wisdom & knowledge on how to heal the body.

I was so grateful for their help that I made a promise to myself..…I would learn as much as I could about the body's structure and synergistic functions so

that one day I could help other people living in pain too!

" Create the life you want to live.....you're worth it"