Then, at the 10-mile mark disaster struck as my stump started swelling, which made it difficult to swap over legs. In the seconds it took to get it out of one socket and into the other it swelled so much, I couldn’t get it on. I panicked a bit, so I sat in my wheelchair and forced my leg into the socket of my high-impact leg. From that point I couldn’t change legs any more, so it became physically harder as I no longer had the ‘spring’ of my blade.
At 19 miles, I hit the wall. I thought to myself: ‘Oh, my God! I’ve got another 7.2 miles to go!’ But the Headley Court ‘no excuses’ mentality pushed me on. I told myself that scores of people have gone through Headley’s doors and I needed to do them proud, plus I’d felt worse pain following the blast and my leg amputation. ‘Keep going, keep going’ I told myself to the rhythm of my foot and ‘Milly’s watching, you can’t let her down’ until I got a second wind. It becomes a mental battle at that stage and not a physical one. Anybody is capable of doing a marathon, even if it’s walking it, but you’ve got to have it in your head: ‘I am not going to stop.’
The final two miles from the 26-mile mark were the worst of all as I was so near, yet so far. I kept telling myself: ‘You are not going to give in and let everybody think you only said you were going to do the marathon because you were drugged up to the eyeballs in hospital.’ There was no way I was going to drop out so Milly would have to tell people: ‘My mummy did three-quarters of a marathon.’ The marathon was about me saying: ‘Do you know what, I might have one leg, but fuck you, two-legged people, because I can do more than you!’ I wanted Milly to be able to go to school and tell her friends: ‘My mum did a marathon with one leg,’ and to see that not having a leg was not detrimental in any way to living a normal life. I wanted her to think: ‘My mum’s got one leg but so what? I bet your mum hasn’t run a marathon and she’s got two.’ Most of all I wanted her to be proud of me. That’s what drove me round the final excruciating stage, although that final point-two of a mile seemed longer to me than the entire race.
When I got to the finish line and I couldn’t actually walk another step, I was on my knees. Blood poured out of the top of my prosthetic liner on my leg every time I put my foot down because I’d blistered my stump so badly pushing myself to my absolute limit. It was so bad it was squelching and making really bad farting noises every time I took a step, which was attractive. Mum and Dad were waiting at the finish with Milly, who was holding the foil blanket. I let out a huge gasp of relief as I crossed the line and she wrapped it around me before saying, ‘Mummy, you’ve just done a marathon!’ She was so excited.
Mum and Dad told me how proud they were of me and then I collected my medal with Milly, who kept asking: ‘Let me see your medal, Mummy!’
So I gave it to her and I said: ‘I did this for you’, so she got to wear it and show it off to everyone.
There was a reception at a local hotel at the end of the race for all the people who had run for Blesma. As it was impossible for me to walk any further, they got me a rickshaw, which, as you can imagine, was quite a feat with all the crowds at the finish line of the London Marathon. Once we got to the venue there was a sports therapist who was performing massage on all of the people who took part. I couldn’t even take my leg off because if I did, it would have swollen so badly I wouldn’t have been able to get it back on, so I hobbled around for a while and kept it on until I got home.
At the do, Milly said to me: ‘Everybody’s told me you are really brave, Mummy, and that you’ve done really well,’ as if she really thought: ‘Well, that’s what they say.’ So she had me in fits of laughter.
The minute I got home I took my leg off and got into the bath. My stump was completely raw and I had huge, angry blisters. Completely exhausted but elated at the same time, as I lay in the hot water, I thought: ‘That’s another box ticked so now I can get on with the rest of my life.’ I couldn’t walk on my prosthetic for two weeks afterwards, but it was worth it. And my boobs had held up – but only because they were already so far gone it really couldn’t have got much worse.
Three days after completing the run I relegated my wheelchairs to the basement of my house. I had two hot-pink wheelchairs as the one they initially made me at Headley Court was made to fit my twenty-one-and-a-half-stone frame. When I lost all the weight it was no longer the right size for me so I had to get another, smaller wheelchair. After the marathon, I said: ‘It’s time for the wheelchairs to go.’ It was another huge moment because I didn’t ever want to use either of them again. Both are still in my basement with all the junk that I don’t use any more.
The only time I spoke about taking part in the marathon again was two weeks later when I went back to Headley Court for rehab and I told the lads: ‘I did the London Marathon the other week.’ They said: ‘Did you really?’ I was so glad I did it, but ultimately, it was just the start of a whole new world opening up for me.
A month later I went back to work, doing the admin job I’d done before I was injured, in Bulford, which I combined with continued three-week stints of rehabilitation at Headley Court. I was incredibly uptight and nervous about returning to work as I’d been out for so long and I worried about how I’d be viewed as an amputee. But my new colleagues were incredibly supportive and it was good for me as I needed to go and face my demons about what going back to work in the Army meant.
At first I took a ‘suck it and see’ approach to decide if Army life was still for me. I hadn’t known anything else since I was seventeen years old. On the one hand I desperately wanted to go back, but it was still incredibly daunting after all that had happened. It was great to be around people, I loved the social side and it continued to help me grow in confidence. I was no longer the bystander in my own life, watching the world pass me by from a wheelchair, and it felt good. The admin role meant I worked pretty much nine to five, so I was a normal working mum, spending all my free time with Milly and cherishing every minute of it, as I knew that’s what mattered.
Six months after the marathon someone from Blesma rang me and said: ‘Do you fancy skiing with us in Colorado?’ Even though I’d never skied on two legs, let alone one, I said: ‘Yes, please!’ and my Commanding Officer was happy to support me going. Headley Court supported me so much in every way, as rehab was as much about building confidence on my legs, as well as self-confidence. Meeting up with all the boys again, many of whom I knew from Headley Court, was great. British Airways upgraded us all to First Class, gave us champagne and really looked after us all, which was out of this world.
After checking into the hotel we all met up for a few glasses of wine in the bar, where I made quite a splash. A few glasses of chardonnay, combined with the champagne on board and jet lag, left me drunk as a lord and I knocked over a Christmas tree in the hotel reception. Because of that shameful incident I was nicknamed ‘Geoffrey’. I haven’t got a clue where the name came from but it stuck and everyone found it hilarious at the time.
On the first morning, and nursing a hangover, we were given all the kit we needed to ski. My first question was: ‘How do you get a ski boot on a prosthetic foot?’ and the answer was simple: put a carrier bag on it first so you can slip it in and out.
I was totally relaxed until I got to the nursery slope, and even though it wasn’t that steep, inwardly I was freaking out. I felt more confident about doing the marathon than I did about being able to ski, so I said to Brendan West, the guy who organises the trips for Blesma: ‘I’m really shitting myself. What if I can’t ski?’
He laughed and said: ‘Come on, Geoffrey, you’ll be fine – you can do it.’
With that a triple amputee snowboarded straight past me and I thought: ‘OK, if he can do it, I’ve got no excuses.’
Then someone else whizzed past, doing one-track skiing – where you ski using just one leg without your prosthetic – shouting: ‘Come on, Hannah, it’s amazing!’
So I decided then I couldn’t bottle out and in truth, I didn’t want to. The first hurdle I had to overcome
was using the button lift, which is a challenge in itself with a false leg. I had to slide the rubber disc between my legs all the while trying to manoeuvre my ski on a foot I couldn’t feel. A few times I rolled off, but because every one of us had two instructors that was a real security blanket as I knew I wasn’t going to go whizzing off, down a mountain, unable to stop myself. They had me skiing on baby slopes within an hour of conquering the ski lift. Admittedly I wasn’t following all the rules while I was going downhill and staying upright, but I did it. I fell over more times than I can recount but I loved every minute and it was another moment of ‘It doesn’t matter that I only have one leg, I can do this’, which was just incredible.
I saw Brendan at lunchtime and he said: ‘How was it?’
‘It is absolutely brilliant! I’m loving it!’ I replied.
The trip was for ten days, and I skied all day and got drunk every night and it was good for everyone. One guy, who was a double amputee, had been a bit in his shell at the start of the week, but by the end he was the life and soul, whizzing down the slopes at breakneck speed in a skiing chair.
Towards the end of the week there was a fancy-dress party, so my roommate and I decided to get the bus to Walmart to buy stuff for our costumes. We were both like Bambi on ice as you can’t feel a thing with a prosthetic in snow boots and I was dressed, of course, as a Christmas tree with about 25 feet of garlands draped around me. My roommate was dressed as an elf so she was dubbed: ‘Geoffrey the Christmas Tree’s Little Helper’ by the lads. Just getting out and doing stuff on our own was a confidence booster.
Flying home I thought: ‘I’ve done a marathon and I can ski now and I couldn’t even do that with two legs.’ It all reaffirmed in my mind that I could have a normal life.
But there was just one thing I still wanted to do – and it involved going back to have surgery. I’d been so energetic that I’d continued to lose weight but my waist size was much bigger than it should have been as I had a lot of excess skin on my stomach from where previously I’d been much fatter. Now it wasn’t plumped up by all the surplus weight I’d been carrying around, the skin had become crinkly and creased and there was an apron of tissue that no amount of exercise would shift. It was uncomfortable, it had rubbed me raw during the marathon and the ski trip and it was debilitating to lug this excess skin around with me.
So, I decided to have a tummy tuck costing £10,500, using more of my Army compensation money. It would be painful – but not compared to what I’d already been through. It was really important to me to have it done, as while I’d reconstructed myself mentally, I wanted to reconstruct myself physically too. I told my mum before the op and she was really concerned about me electing to have another round of surgery.
She said: ‘Hannah, I’ve got your best interests at heart and I’m worried at how much your body can take.’
And I said to her: ‘Mum, can you imagine what it’s like to have to stuff skin into your trousers every day when you are in your twenties? I just don’t want to do that for the rest of my life.’ She also knows me and I was going to do what I was going to do.
So while she expressed her concern at me having yet another operation, when she heard my views she said: ‘While I think it’s a lot for your body to take, ultimately it’s your decision.’
Again I found a very reputable surgeon and as he examined me I said: ‘I don’t mind a vertical scar, so can I have a fleur-de-lis?’ This procedure involves two incisions, across your bikini line and vertically from under your boobs down the tummy, and the skin is pulled tight around your torso, as well as vertically. It’s especially for people who have a lot of excess skin but it’s not for the faint-hearted. I wasn’t worried about the scars as my tummy was already covered in silvery lines from all the surgery I’d had previously.
Right away he said: ‘Absolutely, that is the right procedure for you, it will really make such a difference.’
He booked me in only a couple of weeks later. I wasn’t nervous at all – I just wanted to look normal again. He came to see me once I came round after the op and said: ‘Look down and feel the skin.’ It was so taut, he was obviously pleased with the job he’d done and I was thrilled to see I had a perfectly flat tummy. It even appeared neater than before as he’d been able to cut away a lot of the scarring I’d had from my life-saving surgeries and shrapnel injuries. There were roughly seventy dissolvable stitches. I was in quite a bit of pain afterwards and you have to wear a surgical corset for six weeks, so Jamie helped me and had Milly at his house so I could recover at home.
Ultimately, it was the cosmetic operation that changed my life the most as I no longer had this unsightly sagging skin to tuck in every day. For me that was a massive moment; it gave me huge amounts of body confidence and it felt like I was slowly becoming me again.
After I’d recovered from the surgery, I went motor biking with the charity Bike Tours for the Wounded along Route 66 in America. It was great to be one of the lads again.We all rode pillion on Harley-Davidson motorbikes and my rider had speakers so he blared out rock music as we sped through the Nevada desert. Before the tummy tuck I’d have been sore from my excess skin but this was something I was able to enjoy as a ‘normal’ person (albeit an amputee). And riding along I felt my body was no longer a prison – I felt truly free. ‘This is one of those life moments which are absolutely amazing,’ I thought to myself. While standing at the side of the Grand Canyon I burst into tears, it was so beautiful. I’d never seen anything like it before and I felt so small and insignificant. I thought: ‘God, in the grand scheme of life, things really aren’t that bad.’
At Headley Court I also learned to play sledge hockey, the only full-contact ice sport using a sledge that has one ski under it. You have a shortened hockey stick, you wear a helmet with a cage and full-body armour and you’re allowed to hit your opponent anywhere you want to. All the boys took great delight in hitting me everywhere they could, pushing me over, so I spent half the time on my side on the ice, as getting upright is a total nightmare.
I also went indoor ski-diving for the first time, which was really good, and they had a surf machine, where I rode the air. I wasn’t very good, but I did everything I could so I could go home and tell Milly the stories, and each achievement was also another building block of confidence. Shortly after I returned from the US trip in 2013, I completed my rehabilitation at Headley Court. They must have done a good job in giving me my confidence back as instead of wanting to blindly cling on, I knew I didn’t love the Army anymore. For me it didn’t have the same draw it once had, mainly because physically I struggled to achieve what I had before I was injured.
Then, when I was told that my unit was going to deploy to Afghanistan the following year, it became a watershed moment for me. I was able to do a lot of PT, which was great, and some new fitness tests had been brought in especially for amputees so I knew if I could pass it, they would consider me for redeployment. But there was an insurmountable hurdle: the moment I was told about Afghanistan, I knew I didn’t want to go for I would never leave Milly again. Deep down, I knew with my amputation that I would struggle to function as a soldier on deployment – from the basics of trying to keep my stump clean to prevent infection to the fact that I would find it harder to defend myself with my prosthetic limb.
I didn’t want to spend the rest of my career sat behind a desk – that wasn’t what I joined the Army for. Thanks to the Headley Court rehabilitation and charity support I had achieved more than I’d ever thought possible. Yet I also recognised that physically I couldn’t give the commitment to the Military that it needed. I couldn’t be completely dedicated to the job as my heart wasn’t in it because I wasn’t able to do the job as well as I once had because of my injuries. Because of that it didn’t hold the same draw and it wasn’t for me anymore. That, combined with the fact my priorities had changed and I knew I wanted to be there for my daughter, meant I recognised my career was coming to an end. Going back to work was another thing I had
to tick off my list on the road to being ready to get out of the Military, as it meant I knew I’d moved forward with my life.
In my heart I knew I needed to move on with my life in more ways than one. And the next stage was to also introduce this ‘new me’ to the outside world and in particular to the opposite sex.
It was time for me to start dating again.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
DATING AGAIN
The thought of even chatting to a man I didn’t know, let alone going out on a date with him, was a terrifying prospect. It was a hurdle I had to get over if I ever wanted to move on with my personal life. Yet the thought still scared me half to death. Not only had I been with Jamie for so long, I now had the added stress of having to tell any new man in my life I only had one leg. I couldn’t begin to comprehend how you would bring that up in conversation. Even the thought of saying it out loud to a prospective date terrified me.
Since my gastric bypass, boob job and tummy tuck I was slowly beginning to feel good about myself and I continued to lose the last few pounds of excess weight. These changes in my body were triggering changes in my personality too. I felt like life was flowing back into me. I started wanting to take care of myself not only inside, by eating healthily and keeping up with the exercise programme, but also my appearance on the outside. After years of not even bothering to put on make-up I started to take pride in myself again.
Never Broken Page 18