The wall is coming at me fast, and there is nothing I can do. There is no traction, the brakes on the BMW Mini I am driving started skidding in the rain long ago. I’m helpless and am inside the car, hurtling straight into the wall. The moment slows down enough for me to realize, that it might all be over for me, even though I’m only twenty-three. The last time I checked my speedo, it was going above 150km/hr. Then it’s over. I smell gunsmoke and see black, the airbag has exploded in front of me, my lower back aches. I cannot feel my legs and I’m terrified when I find that I cannot move my toes. I wait, petrified of a future in a wheelchair where I will never walk again.
Moments pass, then my legs begin to tingle and miraculously, I find that I can just begin to wiggle my toes! A tiny spark of relief. Thank God. Gratitude overwhelms me, deep within, I know that if I can feel and move my legs I will be able to walk again.
I promise myself that from now, I will never, ever take this precious body and its ability to move for granted.
It’s then that I realise there are other people in the world. I hear the sirens getting closer and over the boundary of the fence I can see the crowds of people, watching, silent and looking at me and what is left of the car. I feel their concern for me and try to calm down as I think to myself, that I want me to be ok too.
It is the 2003 Melbourne Formula 1 Grand Prix and I have spectacularly crashed in the Celebrity race. After being cut from the car, removed on a stretcher and rushed in an ambulance to hospital, it turned out that I’d broken my pelvis. I was told I was lucky to be alive because the impact needed to break a pelvis is enough of an impact to cause deadly injury to internal organs. If it wasn’t such a scary moment in my life, I’d even be embarrassed! It was a little bit funny when I had journalists trying to sneak into the hospital to interview me when they were not supposed to and there was a big article in the Herald Sun paper the next day. I was prescribed bed-rest for three weeks and my sister Alice came to help look after me and my three year old son.
For me though, it was the first time that I could ever remember, I had to sit still and take a long hard look at my life, where I was at and the way I was living. There were big issues for me that I knew I needed to address and that I couldn’t hide from them anymore. It was a huge wake-up call and the beginning of my journey towards being fit, happier and healthier… mind, body and soul.
This is a journey I am grateful to still be upon today as I step forward on my path towards living my life at my highest potential and helping others be the best can the be.
There have been many key moments in my life that have ‘woken me up’ to something else; the births of my children, a visit to Sedona – a world wide and global power-spot and mecca for intuitive healers and visits to magical Hawaii. Each in their own way, has been a ‘wake up call’ for me to live a more authentic, more meaningful, loving and purposeful life. So now I want to ask you if you would like to reply and as as reference for my next book…
What have been your wake-up calls in life? How have they served you?
In case you are wondering….Luckily I recovered fully from that car accident and it has not stopped me at all. Rather, it has made me grateful for a body that can move and allows me to spend quality time with my family and friends now.
Bike ride with my son, followed by a visit to ice-cream van today! Riding with Liv Girls yesterday
Playing & resting at the park with Amelia & Lucky
I was inspired and ran a marathon a year after that accident, then later carried and had another child and have completed 7 Ironman Triathlons since then.
I’d love to hear what you have to say, and hope that by writing your response, it helps heal you too.
Lots of love
Grace
What have been your life wake-up calls? How have they served you?
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