I'm determined to have a good SEX LIFE

Sleeping with her boyfriend was a defining moment in tetraplegic Heidi Herkes’ journey of recovery

- EIMEAR O'HAGAN

Lying on a faux-fur throw, my date gently kissed me. After a romantic meal, we’d come back to mine to take our fledgling relationship to the next stage. We were just like any other couple, enjoying being intimate – apart from the fact that I’m tetraplegic, meaning I’m paralyzed from the chest down with very limited movement in my arms, although I’m still able to have sex and even climax.

I’m very open about the fact I enjoy sex, but that admission has been met with disbelief at times. There remains a stigma around disabled people having sex, and I want to dismantle that.

Before the accident that left me paralysed, I was a successful bridal hair and make-up artist. Then, in March 2014, I arrived home from a meal and, desperate for the loo, ran upstairs. I lost my footing and fell, crashing to the floor. I ended up with a serious spinal-cord injury near the base of my neck. My memories of my housemate finding me and paramedics arriving are very hazy and I wasn’t aware I couldn’t feel much of my body. Rushed into surgery, I was put into an induced coma. I woke up three weeks later in ICU, my family at my bedside, with a feeding tube and a tracheostomy to help me breathe.

It was terrifying and, as I was on high doses of morphine, I was very confused. When doctors told me the damage to my spine wasn’t fixable – I’d never walk again – I struggled to take it in. I was only 34.

At the time of my accident, I was single, my last relationship having ended six months before. James, now 40, and I had been together for five years after meeting online in 2008, but we’d had our ups and downs and the relationship seemed to have run its course.