''I'm Still Cycling My Way To Gold'
Essentials|September 2017

A cycling accident left Palesa Manaleng paralysed from the waist down, but she has refused to let her disability stand in the way of her dreams

Kerryn Massyn
''I'm Still Cycling My Way To Gold'

One sunny day in September 2014 I said a short goodbye to my new housemates – a bunch of guys I’d only known for a couple of weeks – and headed off for a cycle around my neighbourhood, Westdene.

Sport has always been my escape; when I was younger I did everything from tennis to swimming, but after school cycling became my sport of choice. There was something so freeing about it – the wind against my face when I picked up speed, watching the world blur by as I peddled – and a long cycle became my way of dealing with life.

Ordinarily I’d head out to Roodepoort and Krugersdorp for a long ride but, for some reason, I decided to stay close to home that morning. The ride was like any other, until my brakes failed and I hit a pavement, which sent me flying into a palisade fence. I remember lying on the ground, thinking I’d have to walk my bike back home – but I couldn’t move my legs. It’s all hazy from there, and I think I must have blacked out; all that I can remember after that is waking up in a hospital bed, and the staff telling me I’d been badly injured.

The day my life changed

I’d sustained a head injury, a spinal dislocation, broken ribs, a punctured lung and a shattered shoulder. Numerous surgeries followed, but the doctors told me the worst news: I had a T9/T10 spinal cord injury, which meant that I’d never walk again. I’d lost the use of everything below my waist, and I was a paraplegic.

I was working as a journalist at the time of the accident but I was in no state to go back to the office. Because I wasn’t on medical aid, either, I spent five long months recovering at the Charlotte Maxeke Academic Hospital in Joburg. It was the first time that I’d been in a government hospital, and the treatment I received from the nurses was nothing short of amazing.

Denne historien er fra September 2017-utgaven av Essentials.

Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.

Denne historien er fra September 2017-utgaven av Essentials.

Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.

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