Adventure Magazine

She had been rock climbing
that day at Whanganui Bay,
on the eastern shores of Lake
Taupo, with her good friend and
climbing buddy Jono Clarke.
She had spent the day climbing
harder than she ever had and
was in high spirits, but that
was all about to come crashing
down.
Clarke, who was about 10m in
front of her, heard her scream
and then crash into the lake. He
ran down the steep slope after
her, finding her gurgling and on
her back in shallow water.
“He pulled my head into his
lap so that I was out of the
water,” says Di, who is based in
Wellington.
“I had a lot of pain. I knew that
I'd broken a lot of ribs and
I couldn't really talk. It was
actually painful to breathe.”
The alarm was raised and
soon a boat arrived. She was
carefully lifted onto it via a large
piece of wood and taken to
shore, where a medic-helicopter
was able to land and take her to
Waikato Hospital.
“They actually didn't find my
back was broken for three
days,” Di says.
“At one point, they helped me
stand up on the side of the
bed, and they said, ‘Walk to the
top of your bed.’ But I couldn’t
move my legs. That's when they
checked my back.”
She had broken vertebrae in
her thoracic and lumbar spine,
leading to muscle paralysis
which made it almost impossible
to lift her right foot, or use her
right calf or medial gluteal
muscles.
“I can’t high-step. I can’t tip toe.
Anything on a high shelf, I can’t
reach it.”
She spent six weeks in hospital,
followed by nine months of
recovery at her parents’ home in
Napier - firstly needing a walking
frame, and then crutches.
“At one point, they helped me stand
up on the side of the bed, and they
said, ‘Walk to the top of your bed.’ But
I couldn’t move my legs. That's when
they checked my back.”
Describing her slow but steady
progress, she says: “My walk
was just to the end of my
parents’ drive and back. Then,
one day, I crossed the road."
She returned to Wellington
when she was able to walk
independently and, with the use
of a plastic foot brace, she was
determined to try rock climbing
again - if only just to use some
of the new gear she had.
“I thought I might not climb
again, but I’d organised a
friend of mine to buy me some
climbing shoes while he was in
Europe, and I didn't want to tell
him I didn't need them.
“So I had this new pair of
climbing shoes, but my foot
wasn't strong enough to push
into the shoe. The toes would
just curl up.”
When she finally got the shoe
on and went to the indoor
climbing wall, she found she
couldn’t put any weight on her
right foot.
“It was frustrating at the start
because my foot didn’t work
well. But I had all these rules
about not sulking or complaining
about what I used to be able to
do.
“It’s not worth wishing things
were different because that
doesn’t change anything.”
Slowly she learned to use other
muscles to compensate for
the ones she could no longer
use, and, less than a year after
her accident, she returned to
Whanganui Bay.
“It took me three hours to pack
my bag - I thought I was going
to die this time. But Jono kept
sending my silly text messages
to make me laugh.
“It was a good trip. The worst
part was seeing where Jono had
ran down after me, and knowing
he could have easily injured
himself.”
Within 18 months of the
accident, Di had climbed routes
much harder than anything she
did before her fall.
“I wasn’t any stronger, but I was
thinking more about how I was
climbing. Previously I just did
a move without thinking about
it, but now I had to think about
inventive ways to do moves.”
Before the accident, she
had also been prepping to
try ice and mixed climbing,
a more extreme discipline of
climbing involving ice tools and
crampons.
She didn't want her injuries to
deter that pursuit, but with an
unstable leg, she wasn't too
eager on the long approaches
to New Zealand’s technical
winter climbs. So she ventured
overseas.
Her ice climbing adventures
took her to the US, Switzerland
and Norway. And as her mobility
improved over the years, she
became a frequent attendee
at the ice and mixed climbing
festival in the Remarkables,
where she has established a
number of new routes.
“I felt like I was more scared of
what I’d miss out on if I didn’t do
stuff.”
One of her new winter routes,
on Ruapehu, is called Nervous
Connections.
"Every time you achieve
something, I feel like I'm a
person again, and Nervous
Connections is about things
working again.”
Then, five years ago, she came
across a game-changer: a
new brace that attaches to the
outside of the shoe, so it doesn't
touch the skin.
“This makes it way more
comfortable, but it’s also
mechanical. When your heel
strikes, it transfers energy to lift
the ankle to provide spring.”
First assent Nervous Connections, Ruapehu
Photo by Jono Clark
"Every time you achieve something,
I feel like I'm a person again, and
Nervous Connections is about things
working again.”
Di's old braces above
made climbing hard.
The new brace (image
right) worked so well
she was even able to
run, completing both
the Rotorua and Boston
Marathons
Di's climbing boot in the Turbomed
Display at OTWorld Leipzeg Germany
First day standing at Waikato Hospital.
Photo by Ian Drayton. July 2004
Running the Boston Marathon
in 2018
Back where it all began: Eternity Road, Whanganui bay
Photo by Steve Minchin
32//WHERE ACTIONS SPEAK LOUDER THAN WORDS/#225
32//WHERE ACTIONS SPEAK LOUDER THAN WORDS/#225