Extra: The Day 17-Year-Old Fletcher Crowley Became Paraplegic

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:11):
You're listening to a Mama maa podcast.

Speaker 2 (00:14):
Mamma may I acknowledges the traditional owners of the land
and waters that this podcast is recorded.

Speaker 1 (00:20):
On Hello there.

Speaker 3 (00:21):
My name is Naima Brown and I'm the executive producer
of But are you Happy? I'm in your ears today
to bring you an episode of No Filter, another Mamma
Mia podcast hosted by Mia Friedman. In this conversation, Mia
talks to seventeen year old Fletcher Crowley, whose life completely
changed on September tenth and twenty twenty three when he
broke us back in a dirt biking accident and became

(00:43):
a paraplegic. Fletcher is joined by his parents, Nikki and Pat,
who discussed Fletcher's incredible resilience and how they navigated as
a family such an unexpected life change.

Speaker 4 (00:54):
Let us know what you think, for Mamma Maya.

Speaker 1 (01:06):
This is No Filter. I'm Maya Friedman, and you're about
to hear a beautiful story. It's a story about a
family and what happens to it after a terrible accident,
because sometimes families break apart under the weight of a
terrible thing. Marriages certainly do all the time, but that's
not what happened to this family, the Crowley family. Here's

(01:29):
who's who in this family. There's Pat the dad, Nikki
the mum, and their two sons, Levi who is twenty,
and Fletcher, who is seventeen. Fletcher is the main character
in this story. He's the one that had the accident
six months ago. He became a paraplegic after he landed
on his back coming out of a double backflip on

(01:49):
his bike on a jump that he'd made. He wasn't
just a random dude taking a massive risk with his bike.
I mean it was a risk, obviously, but it was
an informed one because Fletch had been dirt bike jumping
for years, and dirt bike jumping is exactly what it
sounds like. You do flips and tricks off giant dirt
mounds and ramps that you often have built by hand.

(02:10):
And Fletch even had a part time job as a
dirt bike jumping coach, word work and so. On an
ordinary Saturday in September last year, Fletcher's dad got a
phone call from a guy called Sausage. And this is
something that you will here I become obsessed with during

(02:31):
the course of this interview and if you're wondering why
I sound kind of lighthearted when this couldn't possibly should
be a tragic or at least a sad story. Well,
like so many stories that I share with you on
no filter, this one surprised me and it may surprise
you. You See, when something big and messy and unexpected happens

(02:52):
to a child, or a teenager or a young man
whatever you want to call a seventeen year old who
was still at school but very much a man, it
actually happens to the whole family, Which is why you're
first going to hear from Pat and Nikki about how
that day in September and the days, weeks and months
that have followed it have played out since Fletcher's accident.

(03:14):
I wanted to know what it's been like from their perspective,
how they've held it together or not. And then, of
course you're going to hear from the man of the moment, Fletcher.
It's not an ideal thing to happen a few months
before you start your final year of school. So how's
he doing? And might he walk again one day? Enjoy
the time you're about to spend with the Crowley family.

(03:37):
I certainly loved every moment of it. I want to
talk to you about Fletch, and I want to talk
to you about the tenth of September last year, Sunday,
which started as an ordinary day as these days. Do
I believe you were in the supermarket part when you
got a call. Who was on the other end?

Speaker 5 (04:00):
It was Fletch. It was Sunday afternoon, four o'clock. I
was in supermarket.

Speaker 2 (04:04):
I was in the freezer aisle, so we're almost there
and I got a phone call from a random number.
And whenever Fletcher was out riding bikes it had happened,
you know, a phone would be dead. My dad, I'm
ringing from Sausages number, ring me if you need me.

Speaker 1 (04:18):
It's sausage a person.

Speaker 5 (04:19):
Sausage is a person.

Speaker 1 (04:20):
So I'm glad we cleared that up.

Speaker 2 (04:22):
Sausage has been an awesome support for Fletcher to and
a lot of people have, so shouldn't this call Sausage out,
you know? So I took the call and it was
Fletcher and he just said in his way, I don't
know if you said I've had a pickle or I've
had a huge e or you know, I've had an accent.

Speaker 5 (04:36):
And this has happened before. You know, he did an
ACL a year before the same thing happened his knee. Yeah,
it kind of happened.

Speaker 1 (04:43):
It's a high risk sport. Yeah. Did you ever discourage
him from doing it, either of you?

Speaker 5 (04:48):
No, No, we didn't discourage.

Speaker 1 (04:49):
Was that not an option?

Speaker 6 (04:50):
Yeah, well it became not an option when he was
sixteen seventeen.

Speaker 1 (04:54):
You can't. Really.

Speaker 6 (04:55):
He's out every day his whole life all around riding.
You know, he worked in it, he coached in it,
he trained and competed in it. He built the jump
that he hurt himself on, he built bikes, everything, it
was his everything.

Speaker 2 (05:08):
So and I grew up doing stuff like that, not
as extreme as Fletcher, but I wasn't a team sport guy.

Speaker 5 (05:14):
And I was a surfer and a snowboarder and skateboarder,
and it kind of that was part of life.

Speaker 2 (05:18):
So seeing your boys do that, we had a half
part in the backyard from the age of four, so
we would never discourage it, you know.

Speaker 1 (05:26):
So he said, Dad, I've had a bit of a pickle.
I had a huge year, had a stack. How did
he sound. Did his party senses immediately go on alert? Yeah?

Speaker 2 (05:33):
Not ten out of ten, but I said yeah, mate,
and he said, oh, can you come up?

Speaker 5 (05:36):
He was at a place called a Red Hill. Can
you come up? Yep?

Speaker 2 (05:39):
No ways, and I hung up the phone. I'm like, okay,
trolley's full. It could be a broken wrist, something minor.
So I just ring Nick and say, hey, Nick Fletcher's wrong.
He said red Hills out an accent, and I think
I said to you. Did I say something like I'm
not feel yeah?

Speaker 6 (05:55):
I think you said, oh, he doesn't sound yeah. He
didn't say it sound great, didn't yeah.

Speaker 5 (06:00):
But it just didn't feel right.

Speaker 2 (06:02):
So I remember going, now, I'll get the shopping and
Nicky and Levi are going to go up there, and
I was probably ten minutes behind them.

Speaker 1 (06:07):
How far was Red Hill from where you were? NICKI?

Speaker 5 (06:09):
Twelve minutes?

Speaker 1 (06:10):
Oh okay, so pretty close.

Speaker 5 (06:12):
Yeah yeah.

Speaker 1 (06:13):
What did you think on that drive? Did you try
to ring him? Did you try to ring sausage one?

Speaker 6 (06:16):
If Levi's mates drove us up there, I can't remember why.
And on the drive up, I was just I was going,
oh gosh, this isn't doesn't say I did think of her,
the feeling that it didn't sound like it was going
to be good.

Speaker 5 (06:29):
But I had no idea that he.

Speaker 1 (06:31):
What did you discover when you got there? If it's
not too much.

Speaker 6 (06:35):
I got there and before yeah, before the ambulances, before
anyone had got there. But there was two of his
good mates that had laid him down, covered him in
blankets and jumpers on the jump still had not moved him,
but not touched him.

Speaker 1 (06:51):
They knew to cover him up even though wasn't cole Day.

Speaker 2 (06:54):
Now, these are two older guys, mid twenties, really extreme
bike riders.

Speaker 5 (06:58):
Jayden and Wriggles.

Speaker 1 (07:00):
This is just getting better cast of characters.

Speaker 2 (07:03):
The three of them had done for First aid like
two months earlier. Earlier, Yeah, yeah, and they knew exactly
They wouldn't let me take his helmet off they wrapped.

Speaker 6 (07:11):
Yeah, he still had He actually had so much protective
gear on. He had two titanium like leg braces on
because he'd done his ACL all the way down like robotics.
He had like a chest gear on that went hard
on impact. He had you know, a top of the
line helmet on.

Speaker 1 (07:27):
Did you ever find out what the first day that
they administered and all his safety gear protected him from
like I guess it could have been a whole lot worse.

Speaker 6 (07:37):
Yeah, the first day definitely stopped the spinal damage from
being worse, definitely, because the boys did not move him, and.

Speaker 1 (07:45):
And he's to take his helmet off.

Speaker 6 (07:46):
Yeah, and his two vertebrae was shattered, so moving him
would have seven more nerves could have done really well.

Speaker 1 (07:53):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (07:54):
Yeah, So yeah, I got up there and there's a
couple of dads there, and there was a woman that
was I think she was training to be a nurse,
so she's a first year nurse or she might be nurse.
They were all on the outside and they all gave
us a lot of space, and they'd moved all the
kids away because it's probably about thirty people up there.

Speaker 5 (08:11):
Just kids and dads riding it. It was a beautiful day. Yeah.

Speaker 6 (08:14):
I got there and it was so quiet. It was
like the birds weren't even chirping. I just remember it
was because it was like four point thirty cut to five,
and I was just on the dirt and the dirt
was cold, but yeah, it was just it was eerily quite.

Speaker 5 (08:30):
I remember that.

Speaker 1 (08:31):
So it was like a reverence. People knew there was
some bad shit it was.

Speaker 2 (08:34):
Happening, and at that time we didn't know, but we've
since known that Fletcher had the accident. Lay there and
I think he said to Jaden, he said, I can't
feel my legs.

Speaker 5 (08:43):
We didn't know that at that point. I didn't tell
you that Fletcher was calm. It was so calm he started.
It was in no pain with them.

Speaker 1 (08:51):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (08:52):
So coming back to the question on that protective gear,
I think that thankfully saved him from going in with
not only a spinal injury, but an elbow or a
shoulder or Fletcher had nothing but the spine and two
broken ribs. Most people we see in the spinal ward
have hips and shoulders and elbow, so you've got to repair.

Speaker 5 (09:11):
Everything before you get to this spot. I do think
it made a massive difference.

Speaker 6 (09:15):
He cracked his helmet and he had when they took
that off at the hospital, his forehead was just black
and blue.

Speaker 1 (09:21):
And so that's through that extraordinary helmet. Nikki. When you
saw him and you got there, like as a parent,
I imagine you've got the feeling inside you, but then you've
got what you want to project to him. How did
you react outwardly and inwardly?

Speaker 5 (09:40):
I think the entire time, you know, I have to
be a rock.

Speaker 6 (09:43):
I have to be his rock, like I cannot let
him see any weakness, any sadness, any scaring, because if
he was to talk to anybody, he needs to know
that Mum's not going to break down. He needs to
be like, oh God, I can't feel Mum, She's just
going to be a mess.

Speaker 1 (09:57):
You wanted him not to have to look after you,
so you knew when you saw him, and Pat, I
imagine when you arrived it was a similar situation.

Speaker 5 (10:05):
We responded differently, No, we did.

Speaker 2 (10:08):
I remember you you shat with him and held his hand,
and Levi and I were kind of distant.

Speaker 5 (10:13):
I actually remember seeing Levi a.

Speaker 7 (10:15):
Lot, holding his head and the fear in its face.
We just able treat it differently. Nicky was there and
lev and I just kind of.

Speaker 1 (10:26):
Fled well, because you knew that you had to process
what you needed to process, and that Nicki had it.
I imagine we're going to get to the tag teamness of
the last six months, and you know, I'm sure you
two are well practiced at it because of what you've
been through with Levi as well. When the ambulance got there,
I imagine it felt like a hundred years until they

(10:46):
got there.

Speaker 5 (10:48):
Yeah, it did.

Speaker 6 (10:48):
And those guys are insane when you're in the middle
of that kind of thing. They're like this stealth team
that just come in and they all have got their
voices low. They're all like, hey mate, we'll look after you.

Speaker 5 (11:00):
Do you need this? Do you need that?

Speaker 6 (11:02):
And then they all talk amongst themselves and do these
little chess moves and it's just amazing when they don't
know what they're turning up to.

Speaker 1 (11:10):
How many of them were their Oh my god, there.

Speaker 6 (11:12):
Was fieries, police and ambulance. I think there's about two
ambulance and ambulance cast. There's probably about six or eight ambulance,
maybe four police, maybe about five or six ambulance. And
when you see them moving him and the I don't
know the skill I have to have to move him
and make sure that they're not going to do any

(11:32):
more damage to his spinal cord, that all kind of
comes into play. And then the firemen were there because
it was in the.

Speaker 5 (11:38):
Middle of a bush.

Speaker 1 (11:39):
Wow.

Speaker 6 (11:39):
Yeah, so the track was like a washed out gully
they had to walk through.

Speaker 2 (11:44):
Remembering his spinal any movement creates more issues. So then
the conversation became is that the helicopter.

Speaker 1 (11:49):
It can the helicopter land anywhere.

Speaker 2 (11:52):
Yeah, and it became this, like Nikki said, they're just
these stealth calm, they're superheroes. They and we can talk
more about the people involved in this thing, because there
are people in this world that do the most remarkable
jobs for people like us and Fletcher during this process,
and it started with those people.

Speaker 5 (12:09):
They came to the whole spital a month later.

Speaker 6 (12:11):
They knew straightaway, so they got there, they knew this
is what it's going to be.

Speaker 1 (12:18):
Did you watch their body language or try and overhear
their conversations? What did you say?

Speaker 8 (12:25):
Yeah?

Speaker 6 (12:25):
I did see them all kind of look at each other,
and they didn't try to hide anything, but they used
a few technical terms and medical terms and things like that.

Speaker 1 (12:33):
So and I imagine they didn't want to tell you
an anything definitive when he was on the ground, and
they didn't what was he asking questions? Or they were
just mate, we're going to look after you.

Speaker 5 (12:46):
He was so calm, He was very cool seeing shock.

Speaker 1 (12:49):
I think, so, like, what's the difference between being calm
and being in shock? Yeah?

Speaker 2 (12:54):
Yeah, it was almost like he was peaceful. And he
said that since He's like, as soon as it happened,
everything was peaceful and he was joking with the boys.
This is before pain relief, and his biggest concern was
telling Dad because we were going away to go and
he'd missed it the year before. That breaks my heart
when his friends have said since, like, he just didn't

(13:16):
want to tell.

Speaker 5 (13:16):
You because he was worried about Japan. And that's like, oh, man,
because that's what we had been saying.

Speaker 6 (13:21):
When you said before about giving, you know, being courtious
about what he was doing. We've been saying to him, mate,
we're going away in two weeks. If you do any injuries,
you're going to be sitting at the bottom of the hill.

Speaker 5 (13:33):
Again.

Speaker 1 (13:34):
Selfish of him, like honestly timing flat.

Speaker 6 (13:38):
I mean, come on, I had said to him multiple times, mate,
if you break your back, I'm not wiping your bum. Yeah, okay,
a mother's love.

Speaker 5 (13:47):
We counseled our way through that over the last six months.

Speaker 1 (13:50):
Yeah, I'm sure that.

Speaker 6 (13:52):
Was one of the first to him, mate, I will
wipe your bum.

Speaker 1 (13:55):
Yeah, and anything else that's required. How long did it
take to get him out of there and into an
ambulance About.

Speaker 5 (14:03):
An hour and a half.

Speaker 2 (14:04):
I think, well, even two nights ago, we sat around
talking about this conversation and what we remember, and it's
incredible how there's a whole moment in time that I
don't remember at all.

Speaker 5 (14:14):
Being in a couple of rooms nicking Fletcher. I remember that.

Speaker 2 (14:17):
I don't remember, but it was four point fifteen, and
by nine point thirty he was being operated on. So
those five hours were a blur, and we all have
different memories of them. But the fact that they did
that in five hours is another superhero thing, right, Because
the quicker you can get a spinal patient to a
theater to release the pressure on the spinal cord, the
better the end result.

Speaker 1 (14:38):
So time was of the essence. It wasn't like, okay,
well let's move him really slowly so nothing happens. The
clock was also ticking. I didn't realize that.

Speaker 2 (14:46):
And so I think it was probably four fifteen. I
reckon we would have been there by six. But we
got this incredible Green Corridor which we knew nothing about,
which is.

Speaker 5 (14:58):
That like the Green Whistle, No, it's even better. Right,
So we left Beacon Hill and we were heading the
Royinal Shore.

Speaker 1 (15:04):
How did you get there? Were you in the ambulance.

Speaker 2 (15:06):
I was with the big dog behind with the guitar.
I wish I remember his name because it was an
awsome man. And that was That's a whole other conversation
because I lost it in there. NICKI sent a message
that said he can Fletcher can feel his toes. I
cried and I said to the guy and I could
tell in his face he was like wow.

Speaker 5 (15:23):
So he'd come off this kind of base of like
this is really bad.

Speaker 1 (15:27):
There could be hope.

Speaker 2 (15:28):
Yeah, but the Green Corridor is the policeman or whoever
does it, turns every single traffic light from Bellrows to
north Shore Green right, So by the time we got to.

Speaker 5 (15:37):
Chatswood, the traffic jams.

Speaker 2 (15:40):
On either side of the road. So we just got
this forty that was a thing. So they do this
stuff again, it's the Superheroes.

Speaker 1 (15:48):
Can you order it? In fact?

Speaker 5 (15:49):
Exactly?

Speaker 6 (15:54):
And I was like, wow, We've got every green light.
That's insane.

Speaker 1 (15:59):
What a lucky day.

Speaker 9 (16:01):
And I'm like day ever, Sunday afternoon on the Northern Beaches,
it just doesn't.

Speaker 5 (16:05):
Happen, right, Yeah.

Speaker 1 (16:08):
In the ambulance, Nikki, he was fletch. Was he asking
about his legs? Were you asking him or was it
kind of this thing that no one wanted to know.

Speaker 6 (16:17):
There was two paramedics with him though, at either end,
and the woman that was at his feet was kind
of moving them and adjusting stuff, and she said, can
you feel this? And he could feel her touching them,
like he could feel a sensation.

Speaker 5 (16:31):
So yeah.

Speaker 6 (16:32):
And when he said he said, I can feel that,
she just looked at me and she should have nodded
her head like she didn't want to say it was
good yeah out loud, because that you know, she just
didn't know.

Speaker 1 (16:43):
But it's better than what you would expect to which
I can't feel anything.

Speaker 6 (16:46):
No, yeah, but he was still joking around in there.

Speaker 2 (16:49):
He's shown this spirit from the minute it happened, and
it's something as a parent that you can't prepare for
and you don't know how you child's inn to respond.
I think it came from the calmness of the accident.
He's just shown this. I don't even know what the
word is, this strength and positive approach to okay, right, oh,
we're on.

Speaker 5 (17:07):
This is me. He's just a remarkable him and.

Speaker 1 (17:12):
What struck me and I've followed the story and watched
every video that he's posted and that you guys have
posted there's a complete absence of self pity. And I
don't know why because I have a lot of self
pity and I haven't experienced what he's experiencing, Like where

(17:33):
did it go his self pity? And have there been times? Surely?

Speaker 2 (17:38):
We said the other night, remember we were saying Fletcher
never got angry or sad, and he goes, yes, I did.
And there was one night I was with him because
we stayed in this little, this weird room at the hospital,
which was great because we didn't have to leave. We
were there for eight days, right, and these two little
single beds and we'd just go and come, you know,
through the night.

Speaker 5 (17:56):
It was one of us with Fletcher the whole time.

Speaker 2 (17:58):
And I was there at three in the morning and
he was having a pretty tough time. It was probably
two or three days in and he's holding my hand
and he was squeezing it and he's swearing at Redhill
and he was angry that night and he went, yeah,
remember that that was when I was angry. And it
was almost like in his mind, he went, that was
my hour, that was when I was angry. And he
said to me, can I swear please, I fucking hate bikes.

Speaker 5 (18:21):
I'm just going to use my camera now.

Speaker 2 (18:23):
Two or three days in he showed this strength of like,
oh well, I hate Red Hill that's where it happened.

Speaker 5 (18:28):
Yeah, get rid of my bikes. I'm just going to
take photos.

Speaker 2 (18:30):
Because a big part of Fletcher's life was filming riding
as well. I don't know where the self pity went
or was it just never there On the same day.
Was it the first day and he said, I'm just
happy I can move my arms. He didn't say I'm
disappointed I lost my legs.

Speaker 5 (18:46):
I'm happy I can move my arms.

Speaker 1 (18:48):
That's a pretty remarkable angle to take on the situation
he went into surgery. Were you like texting madly? Was
your phone blowing up? Like the adrenaline surging through you
both must have been unbearable.

Speaker 6 (19:02):
We couldn't sleep, I couldn't sit still. I was just
pacing around this room. It was probably about as big
as this. We didn't know who to text because we
didn't know it was like three in the morning or
two in the morning, because the operation went.

Speaker 5 (19:14):
For nine till two or something came at it two
in the morning.

Speaker 1 (19:17):
And so your families didn't know friends next morning.

Speaker 6 (19:21):
No, we didn't want anyone to feel like they had
to do something. You're doing someone at two in the
morning and go, yeah, it just broke his back. He's
in major surgery and they're awake going yeah they want.

Speaker 1 (19:30):
And you didn't have answers for any of their questions,
I imagine too. Plus you would have had to deal
with all their feelings about it, which we'll get to
in a minute, because I'm sure that did happen. So
he came out of surgery. What were they doing in
the surgery.

Speaker 6 (19:41):
We didn't even know. They don't even tell you. They
just say, look, we've got to take him in take
the pressure off his spinal cord. And we didn't even
meet the head doctor. Yeah, we met his register. Yeah, sidekick,
he challenged Nick.

Speaker 5 (19:58):
He's like, cause he's got done this before.

Speaker 1 (20:00):
And this is a fair question, which experience is this guy?

Speaker 9 (20:04):
Guy?

Speaker 5 (20:05):
But we now know that doctor Harton is like the guy.
So we were blessed.

Speaker 2 (20:09):
You know, there's so much about this that on Sunday
night it brings him up right. So the fact that
we are ten kilometers from the greatest spinal ward in
the country, with the greatest spinal surgeon in the country.
The things that we've been grateful for through this whole thing.
It started from the ambulance guys and it still continues today, right,

(20:31):
the people that help us and help Fletcher's. We are
honored and so lucky to be like here, I think
it's Australia, right, We're.

Speaker 5 (20:39):
Really like yeah.

Speaker 6 (20:40):
But the question about if they were going to tell
us what they're going to do. He came in after
the operation and he said, right, I've put twelve screws
in his back and two titanium rods, and I was like,
what the hell the things that he told us that
he did.

Speaker 5 (20:55):
We were just both go smack to it. This is
my trauma. I was like, what couldn't you just straight?

Speaker 2 (21:06):
But after the fact, you kind of now understand why
the urgency in the speed and like this is a
high impact accident that if we don't do this, we
could be in a whole lot more trouble, like what, well,
I don't know now, maybe a complete sever to his
spinal cord.

Speaker 1 (21:22):
Can you just, I'm sure you're experts in it, now,
give just a basic explanation of how My understanding is
that it's the point at which you break your spine
or injure your spine, that determines how much function you
will have, how much bodily function you'll have. So did
you very quickly get across all of that terminology and
what was good and what was bad?

Speaker 6 (21:43):
No, not really, not until we're in like the acute
rehab area where we were seeing all the other spinal injuries,
because they don't really tell you that. They just tell
you what your injury is and what that's going to
mean for you. Even then, every single spinal injury is
so unique. You can have exactly the same break in
exactly the same place, with very similar damage and all

(22:04):
that sort of thing, and you can have completely different
sensation and completely different usage of your bound bladder on
your legs.

Speaker 5 (22:11):
So they just told us a level.

Speaker 6 (22:13):
They said it was eighteen nine that he basically shattered
and broken.

Speaker 1 (22:18):
And where in his back is that it's kind of
a brass strap. Oh we quite high?

Speaker 6 (22:23):
Yeah, yeah, but then they rod and they screw above
and below that, so they can't just fix those two.
So the rods I think are about they're about twenty centimeters.

Speaker 1 (22:34):
Yeah, does it mean that you don't have movement below
that point of impact. It doesn't mean that.

Speaker 2 (22:40):
The point of impact T nine is above where Fletcher's
sensation and stops at the belly button, So there's.

Speaker 5 (22:46):
Probably a window. I guess the nerves go.

Speaker 1 (22:49):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (22:50):
I don't know exactly how it works, but there's this
thing called asia rating. So it starts with your T
nine or C three or C four, it's it's a vertebrae,
and then an A is a complete sever So your
spinal cord is ripped in half and you have no feeling.
So you've got nothing, no feeling, no movement, nothing an ear.
People like us, right, our spinal cord is completely intact.
So Fletcher was diagnosed with TB, so as bad as

(23:13):
it gets before, you've got nothing. What happens with spinal
is everyone tolds you from day one, we don't really
know where it's going to end for up to two years,
and there are some people that say we don't know
where it's going to end for.

Speaker 5 (23:23):
Up to fifteen to twenty years.

Speaker 1 (23:24):
Oh wow.

Speaker 2 (23:25):
So you may have seen him move his toes at
sixty the other day we're in the gym, and he's
got this ability now to kind of move his quad
to push a bit, so the swelling goes down. The
body is incredible and can remap itself, you know, neuroplasticity.
You know, we've we've become experts, but it's extremely individual.

Speaker 1 (23:45):
What were those first couple of months, Like, he spent
two months in hospital after the.

Speaker 5 (23:50):
Surgery, seventy seven days.

Speaker 1 (23:52):
Seventy seven days.

Speaker 5 (23:54):
We were in there every day.

Speaker 1 (23:55):
What was life like?

Speaker 6 (23:56):
I know, I felt like I was just stuck in
a TimewARP and nothing else outside of going to the
hospital and being there with him. I didn't even eating,
working nothing.

Speaker 5 (24:08):
I was just numb.

Speaker 1 (24:09):
What did you have to do with the sticks of
your life? You know, your work?

Speaker 5 (24:13):
Yeah, feeding a dog and then.

Speaker 1 (24:16):
Trips to Japan. I mean that must have been a
housele to cancel that.

Speaker 5 (24:19):
Well, actually I went what did we do?

Speaker 6 (24:26):
Like, we told all of our close friends straight up,
and everyone was like, right, what do we do? I mean,
LEVI took a week off work. He's an apprentice electrician,
so he was with us, and then he went back
home and he was there to feed the dogs.

Speaker 5 (24:39):
My mom flew down. She was there for two weeks.
She just kind of kept the house together.

Speaker 6 (24:44):
But yeah, very quickly and when everyone started finding out
everyone like it's insane.

Speaker 5 (24:51):
Family, the food, the school.

Speaker 6 (24:54):
Yeah, it was just insane. So people all helped.

Speaker 1 (24:57):
So that really needs to bring curries.

Speaker 6 (24:59):
Yeah, lots tory, Yeah, lots of ye.

Speaker 5 (25:04):
Shepherd's fine.

Speaker 2 (25:06):
You don't know the extent of your network until something
that happens.

Speaker 6 (25:11):
I would never have guessed that that was going to happen.

Speaker 5 (25:13):
Not for a second.

Speaker 2 (25:14):
And our community in my business industry, like so many
people lent in and I guess you feel a bit guilty,
and you'd say that to close friends.

Speaker 5 (25:24):
You know, why is everyone bothering you?

Speaker 2 (25:25):
Know wise the attention, but you I began to go,
you know what, maybe I've earned this. Maybe over the
last forty nine years, I've been a good human. I've
cared about people, and people are going, now we're going
to double down and help the.

Speaker 5 (25:38):
Boys, right like so so that we wrestled a bit
with this.

Speaker 2 (25:42):
You probably need all of that with your working industry
and people.

Speaker 6 (25:47):
You have to start a new job three weeks, right.

Speaker 5 (25:49):
And I rang my boss and said, look, this has happened.
I reckon, I'm just going to take a week off.
I was going the whole time, and then I rang
on the friday.

Speaker 2 (26:00):
And I'm like, I don't think I can come back in,
and they said, we don't expect to see.

Speaker 5 (26:04):
Until Christmas, and that was September. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (26:06):
Yeah, but look, and I took four weeks, and I've
been really fortunate, really fortunate.

Speaker 5 (26:11):
But people. I have this belief that.

Speaker 2 (26:12):
People are genuinely good people, and I just think those
times people go.

Speaker 5 (26:16):
You know what, will do this guy favor?

Speaker 2 (26:18):
Yeah, and we're lucky, but the seventy seven days became
a weird time of we were there from you know,
you could get in at eleven or ten and literally
you know, you think his son's in there, and you
can go in, but you can't.

Speaker 5 (26:32):
Write because there's a lot of privacy for.

Speaker 2 (26:34):
A lot of other spinal patients because it's quite The
morning routine in the spinal ward is really quite intense.

Speaker 5 (26:40):
Why is that It's the time for the.

Speaker 2 (26:42):
Showering and the bathroom routine and people are being hoisted
out of bed.

Speaker 6 (26:45):
You know, it's so very vulnerable people in there with
pressure saws, people in there. He had more movement than
anyone in the spinal ward. Yeah, so he wasting the start.
He was really really lucky because he's young and he
was fit and he was healthy. You know, really he
just broke up bones in his back and a few ribs.
He wasn't in a car accident.

Speaker 1 (27:06):
Just did you meet lots of other families and loved
ones that must have been a bonds forged in fire.

Speaker 5 (27:14):
Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 6 (27:15):
Yeah, there's a couple of people that we really kind
of came in at the same time. You know, women
that the same age as me as us and their
husband's had fallen off a ladder and were complete cords
and you're just looking at them going like, you know,
we're so lucky, and the poor husband's seeing they're going,
I was going about to retire, it's just.

Speaker 1 (27:36):
About to wow. So it's like every conversation you have,
every time you make eye contact, there's a heartbreaking star.

Speaker 5 (27:42):
Oh my god.

Speaker 2 (27:43):
Yeah, so many and that Actually I've had this conversation
a lot of people that other people's pain can make
yourself feel better, and I know that's horrible, but Nikki
just said a couple of times, We're so lucky.

Speaker 5 (27:54):
So often would be in there going, we are so lucky, And.

Speaker 1 (27:58):
Isn't that extraordinary? How the definition of lucky can really
change depending on the context and in the spinal ward.
When your seventeen year old son can still move his
arms and doesn't other head injury, you are the lucky ones.

Speaker 2 (28:11):
Yeah, and has this incredible positive outlook on life.

Speaker 5 (28:14):
Right.

Speaker 2 (28:15):
So we've often said, if Fletcher hadn't approached this, the
way Fletcher was able to, our lives would be completely different.

Speaker 6 (28:21):
And you know, it would be normal to be in
the fetal position, curled up, not wanting to see the world.
That would be normal. What he's doing is not the norm.
You know, most people are in there pretty in a
pretty dark place at start.

Speaker 1 (28:33):
How have you both gone on your like? Would have
been the lowest moments? I'll ask you first part like,
because I imagine there have been some, and they might
not be what people would expect them to be. Yeah,
sometimes little things can get you.

Speaker 2 (28:47):
Oh yeah, yeah, Look I said to someone earlier. I
frame it in this sense that I cried every hour
for the first week, and then the next week was
every second hour, and it kind of it extends out
and it's anything.

Speaker 1 (28:57):
What were you crying about?

Speaker 2 (28:59):
I think it was probably and it's crazy to think it,
but it's what Fletcher won't have and what I started doing,
and Fletcher doesn't even know this, but I started writing
a list of all the things in my life that
Fletcher will do, and I started doing that on day two.
Fletcher will go and travel, you know, all the things,
and I think that helped me kind of frame up

(29:19):
that it will be okay. And there was an awesome
woman at the hospital, Chanel Social. I don't know what
exactly a role was, but she on day two kind
of went listen. She's a direct lady, but she said,
Fletcher's going to be completely independent. So at that point
I kind of went okay, And you then understand that
independence means you can live alone, but you can do
anything we all do.

Speaker 5 (29:40):
And from there on I kind of moved on.

Speaker 2 (29:42):
But my dark points were just probably vulnerable moments of
sadness for the loss of what we call a normal life.

Speaker 5 (29:49):
So I've also framed up what's a normal life.

Speaker 2 (29:51):
On the fifth night, we had a conversation that a
friend had teed up with the parents from Brisbane whose
son had become a quad four or five years ago,
and we had a zoom call in this little weird
room we lived in and for me seeing them four
years on that their son was in the US playing
wheelchair rugby.

Speaker 5 (30:09):
They were about to go to.

Speaker 2 (30:10):
Italy to go on a big bushwalk, and I kind
of went, you know what, Wow, we're going to be okay.

Speaker 1 (30:14):
So I was like seeing your few like looking at
a crystal ball of like, oh, this will be us
one day.

Speaker 2 (30:20):
And at that moment, I mean, you've done some looking.
But there's not a big network for mums and dads, nothing,
there's nothing.

Speaker 5 (30:27):
So I think our.

Speaker 2 (30:28):
Cruise not crusade. But what I want to give that,
I want to give that early. Listen, things are going
to be okay. Just they will be because someone else said, imagine,
as a human, there's nine thousand things you can do
on the planet, right walk a dog, climb a tree,
traveled to Italy, knock out two thousand of them a
person in a chair can't do, and you'll probably only

(30:50):
do two or three thousand anyway, So choose the three
thousand you can do, Fletch, and life will be awesome.

Speaker 1 (30:57):
I heard that you said to Fletter really early, which
paralympicsport are you going to play?

Speaker 6 (31:02):
We just joked around a lot and we just you know,
and so we'd kind of just take the piss out
of a bit and we'd say, mate, choose this sport.
You're seventeen, you can do think And so he was
kind of funny about it, but I think he did
kind of take it on board and he's like, right, yeah.

Speaker 5 (31:17):
So yeah.

Speaker 6 (31:18):
I think early on he decided that he wanted to
wheelchair across the country at some point. So I'm sure
he'll tell you if that's, you know, something that he
wants to do. But skiing, skiing, Yeah, he's going to
write again.

Speaker 1 (31:31):
Because that appetite that he has for risk and adrenaline
and you know that got him into this pickle in
the first place hasn't gone right. So he's still got
to find and you've got to watch him find ways
to still exercise that risk.

Speaker 2 (31:48):
Instagram posts of people in chairs doing the craziest ship
and he.

Speaker 5 (31:55):
Just went noos through the air. But we won't be
able to stop that. It's Fletcher.

Speaker 1 (32:06):
After the break, Nicki tells me about the exact moment
she learned for sure that Fletcher's injury was going to
be life changing.

Speaker 5 (32:14):
And then I just collapsed on the ground.

Speaker 6 (32:16):
That was the worst. I felt like I was going
to vomit. I've never felt.

Speaker 1 (32:20):
I just stay with us, Nikki, what about you. Showers
are good for crying in I'm such.

Speaker 5 (32:30):
A shower cry.

Speaker 6 (32:33):
And you know what, the other woman in the hospital
whose husband I added the accident, we bonded over that
because she's really really positive and yeah, great, and so
we talked a lot.

Speaker 5 (32:42):
She said, Oh no, I get all that shit.

Speaker 6 (32:43):
Ut sit in the shower, sit in the ground, and
I just bore my eyes out and then I get out,
I wash my face and.

Speaker 5 (32:49):
Dry myself down. It's all down the drain and washed away.

Speaker 9 (32:53):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (32:53):
And that's exactly how I felt, and that's exactly where
I did all my crying.

Speaker 1 (32:56):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (32:57):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (32:57):
But the worst part for me was the most horrific
part was when the doctor came into the room and
as just before that even operated, which just still blows
my mind. I think they've done a c T scan
on him. She had this look on her face. The
room was all dark. We were waiting in this room.
Could we turn the light off because it was, you know,

(33:19):
eleven o'clock and I think we're just in shock. And
she just looked at us. I think I went just no, no, no,
and she just nodded her head, didn't say anything, and
I just went.

Speaker 5 (33:31):
No, no, No, louder and louder and louder, and she's
just going nodding her head.

Speaker 1 (33:36):
And then I just.

Speaker 5 (33:37):
Collapsed on the ground.

Speaker 6 (33:38):
I was just, you know, I was because I felt
like I was asking her he's not going to walk again,
and she was saying yes, And that was the worst.

Speaker 5 (33:49):
I felt like I was going to vomit. I've never felt,
you know.

Speaker 6 (33:51):
I think I just at that moment, for all the
people out there that have lost children, I just felt
an iota of what they the pain that people must
go through. In that point, I felt like I had
my toe in the door. But I can't even that'sn't
even cruel to even compare that to an the parent
that's lost a child. But yeah, I was just because

(34:14):
we had no idea what that meant. We just had
no idea.

Speaker 1 (34:17):
She'd come to tell you that he couldn't walk.

Speaker 6 (34:20):
Yeah, but they'd only done a scan on him. They
hadn't opened, hadn't done anything. And I never saw that
woman again ever, not in any surgeries, not in any ice.

Speaker 5 (34:28):
You would nothing.

Speaker 6 (34:29):
Nowhere and I think Patnell were both really pissed that
she just came.

Speaker 5 (34:34):
In and gave that to us. I felt like she
should actually.

Speaker 1 (34:37):
Say it, or you just you didn't. It was an
unspoken question that she answered and he knew what yeah,
and we both yeah.

Speaker 2 (34:45):
And she did get on her knees and kind of
held our hands and stuff, but she didn't open her mouth.
And that could go into a whole conversation about doctors, Yeah,
through this process, because I don't want to get sued,
but the doctors have a very different way of dealing
with these things and every other care through the process.
And that was the first sign of how we were

(35:05):
told our son had broken his back.

Speaker 1 (35:08):
Was she a doctor?

Speaker 5 (35:09):
We don't even know he had a green ouse? I'm
pretty sure did.

Speaker 1 (35:11):
She even work out the hospital? Was she even real
part of our imagination?

Speaker 6 (35:21):
But we both remember it, which was yeah, and that
for a long time, that was like picking a scab.
I was like, at that moment, it was just horrible.

Speaker 1 (35:30):
Did you do that? Bargaining of just looking back and
that day and if only? And if only? Because there
was also vision of the jump. Have you ever watched it?

Speaker 5 (35:41):
I haven't watched it. No, No, Well Fledge put some
of it on instat I've seen that bit.

Speaker 1 (35:47):
But it cuts out as before he falls has he
watched it.

Speaker 6 (35:51):
He didn't watch it until he put that up, so
that was probably.

Speaker 1 (35:55):
He watched the whole thing, though he watched the fall.

Speaker 6 (35:57):
And you know what, he said, I've had much worse accidents.
I should have broken my back five months ago.

Speaker 1 (36:03):
I love him.

Speaker 2 (36:03):
We've discovered a lot through this, and but he still says,
and I'm sure he'll say it to you, that it
was still the best stage riding he's had.

Speaker 5 (36:11):
He still cherishes that day, which blows my mind.

Speaker 2 (36:14):
Yeah, that he still remembers that date as an awesome day.

Speaker 5 (36:19):
Yeah, who could do that?

Speaker 1 (36:21):
What have you had to do to your house, to
your life? Like, what changes have had to be made practically,
because obviously emotionally it's a goddamn journey.

Speaker 5 (36:33):
I quit my job. The only did that recently.

Speaker 9 (36:36):
You know.

Speaker 6 (36:36):
I had a great employer as well that I've been
working with for ten years, and so she let me have,
you know, work from the hospital, you know, from home,
So that was really flexible. But once I realized how
much work was going to be involved in dealing with
the NDAs just having Fletcher at home, taking to appointments,
mopping the bathroom, flora, but times had a shower, emptying

(36:57):
all the bins, making his bed or just everything. You
just become a care it's basically cleaning and tiding, and
you know, ordering all of his supplies, which he will
take over as he gets older. But all the logistics
of it that just is so time constituting.

Speaker 1 (37:12):
You think this will be forever or this is just
an interim phase while everybody recalibrates.

Speaker 2 (37:20):
And the house is We're really fortunate to have a
house didn't need a lot for just getting home, but
it does need a lot for full time living. So
once we have a bathroom that functions well for Fletcher,
a lot of the morning stuff will be okay. But
we haven't even started that. Like the ot was out
yesterday to work out what the house has to do.
But there are some people that live in two story houses.

Speaker 5 (37:41):
We don't.

Speaker 2 (37:41):
We've got a flat block that can't go home for
months and months and months. So we're really blessed. Again,
I come back to the well, we're lucky. We were
home within six months and we function, and Fletch's got
a good friend who's now his care and he's taking
a lot of the lower In the mornings, he comes
and he picks him up and he cleans.

Speaker 1 (38:00):
His an actual friend from school. Yeah, Leroy, I was
going to ask about his friends. I'm going to ask
Fletch as well. But from what you've seen of how
his friends.

Speaker 6 (38:09):
Have maved god boys.

Speaker 1 (38:11):
There's a lot to take on as a seventeen.

Speaker 6 (38:14):
When that first happened, the greatest gift we got was
this social worker and she was in the ICU. Your
name is Kerry, and I think it was like day two.
She said, his generation, he needs his phone and he
needs his friends around him, and we, like, naturally we
would have been like, no, keep everyone away, keep his
phone away from it. Yeah, because he's on the heaps
of drugs too.

Speaker 5 (38:34):
So what you're doing.

Speaker 6 (38:37):
And as soon as we got the boys, it gave me.
You know, he was on his phone again and we
got the boys in straight away or just whoever he wanted.

Speaker 5 (38:44):
I had to kind of manage it a bit.

Speaker 1 (38:46):
But those boys, you were saying that you had to
tell them to use some hand sanitize it because they
like rocked up from the skate park or the bike
park or whatever, covered in Martin dirt. Yeah. I was
just guys, this is the hospital a sterile environment, and
the bike riding community are a huge part of how
we got through this.

Speaker 2 (39:06):
Yeah, right afternoons, you know, we don't even want to
start talking about the gun in the hospital, but right
out eons was beers and tattoos out in the front of
roll and I sure, hospital, but I know that sounds weird.
But that bonding, that normality for Fletcher with his friends,
and I think that's been a huge part of it.

Speaker 5 (39:24):
We've been good, but I think his friends have been yeah.

Speaker 6 (39:26):
Yeah, and that's because they've seen him at his very
worst and they've been there the whole time. They take
him out. He's out all weekend, every night, his mates
can pick him up. There's you know, I don't know,
our generation not scared of.

Speaker 5 (39:40):
Him, no way. Yeah, because he's still Fletcher. Yeah, and
he's a sad person. You know, As someone else.

Speaker 2 (39:46):
Said that, just because you've got legs at work doesn't
mean you have a good life, because there's a lot
of people that have perfect legs that have really horrible lives.
And that's always stuck with me too, Right, It's not
the sign of a happy, good life having legs at
work at all.

Speaker 1 (40:01):
Yeah, you guys aren't strangers to hospitals.

Speaker 5 (40:05):
No, I, we were there last. Yt Nikki was there
at another full body scan last night, not me last.

Speaker 1 (40:11):
Let's talk about Levi because really, I say, this whole
thing is Fletch really pulling some focus from his older brother.
He's really had a lot of medical attention and attention
from his parents due to his own condition. Big move
by Fletcher. But what have you been dealing with with
Levi for these past few years?

Speaker 6 (40:30):
Levi's is so you know what, it seems weird to
say which is worse or which is more serious? But
I look at Fletcher is going to get better and
better and better. Every time Levi has a scan, It's
just another punch in the chest.

Speaker 5 (40:45):
What are we going to find?

Speaker 6 (40:47):
How So, Levi has von Hippo Lindau, which is known
as VHL, which creates tumors in the nervous system and.

Speaker 5 (40:54):
Brain spine, eyes. Is Kidney's adrenals real and central mem Yeah, yeah,
and we discovered that in twenty twenty.

Speaker 9 (41:04):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (41:04):
Nice in COVID. Nice COVID gift. He was doing year eleven.
He was seventeen as well, almost same time of the
year years and.

Speaker 1 (41:12):
Honestly, that's what they said.

Speaker 6 (41:16):
The third child will be shaking in their boots.

Speaker 5 (41:21):
Yeah. Yeah, So that was just that was a roller coaster.

Speaker 1 (41:27):
What kind of tumors are they they're.

Speaker 2 (41:29):
Different different parts of the body, but they're basically a
blood tumor. So LEVI have a genetic disorder, which means
his body believes there's more oxygen in his system than
there is, so his body produces extra red blood cells
to move the oxygen, gets to.

Speaker 5 (41:43):
The lungs and goes, there's no oxygen here.

Speaker 2 (41:45):
This is the basic form. So then goes where shall
I go? And they go to those parts of the
body and become tumors.

Speaker 5 (41:50):
They just know. The kidney ones tend.

Speaker 2 (41:53):
To become cancerous, but the brain and the eyes and
ears and whatnot don't. So he had twelve surgeries and
a brain on his eye.

Speaker 1 (42:00):
Because you've got to have them remove. You've got to
remove the tumors, right, Yeah.

Speaker 6 (42:02):
And when they get to a certain size other than
the eyes, they usually let them get to you know,
three centimeters or until they're impacting on your life because
they get so many chimbers. They just don't want to
be operating and just going in there and taking them
out all the time. So Levi has nine gymers and cerebellum.
He's got two on his spine. He's got one on
his kidney that we think might need surgery.

Speaker 5 (42:25):
Yeah, that come out. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (42:28):
Do you get some kind of family discount at the hospital,
you know what? Or at least free parking that's the
most expensive part of because I think we deserve it.

Speaker 5 (42:40):
Yeah, yeah, I think we do too.

Speaker 1 (42:42):
What's his view on all of this? Like, your family
has been through a shit ton and he's still going
through it. How's Levi processed all of this?

Speaker 6 (42:53):
Well, Levi's is not a visual disability or illness. So
you see him, you can't even tell he's blind in
one eye. There's nothing to see. So Fletcher's like the
icon of disability. Yeah, like you know he's on toilet doors.

Speaker 1 (43:06):
He's like he is, he's got a cover. He's true.

Speaker 2 (43:11):
Levis is this thing that's there that we heat and
we all live with, but doesn't impact his life day
to day work, He parties with his friends, he goes
like it's it's always there, it's just there, and it's
the annual thing.

Speaker 5 (43:24):
And he but again, he.

Speaker 1 (43:26):
Scanned once a year. Then you get the news and
then it's like what are we going to do this year?

Speaker 5 (43:31):
Yeah, so it's the eighth of April. Yeah, eighth of
April next.

Speaker 6 (43:34):
Yeah, so you scan and then it's two weeks later
and you have the cancer specialist, a rare cancer specialist.

Speaker 5 (43:41):
So you know what, that's also amazing. We're just felling
you somehow.

Speaker 1 (43:46):
You know, it's just great though. You know, it's funny
looked after, a fucking weird but amazing.

Speaker 2 (43:55):
And I think it comes from i'll say, the wood
side of the family, Nikky side. There's this ability to
I was going to say it earlier, like when we're
in the in the hospital with Fletcher, you joked, you
make it funny. They level it down, right, And I
think our boys have taken can this level it down?

Speaker 5 (44:11):
It's okay, it's cool because.

Speaker 2 (44:13):
Levi doesn't wallow in the corner either at all, whereas
I would wallow in the corner.

Speaker 5 (44:19):
So I think it's I do.

Speaker 2 (44:20):
I think it's the genetic side of what Nikki brought
to our children that has made them positive and go
all right, well, let's go, we'll move through this and
smile and just continue.

Speaker 1 (44:30):
Just finally, before I go grab fletch, what have you
learned about yourself, Nikki, through this.

Speaker 6 (44:39):
Oh, how much you cope with without completely going mad?

Speaker 1 (44:44):
Yeah?

Speaker 6 (44:44):
Sometimes I just think, God, am I God a nervous
breakdown today?

Speaker 1 (44:48):
Yeah, like it would be fair enough if you did,
but you kind of can't.

Speaker 5 (44:52):
No, exactly exactly.

Speaker 6 (44:53):
But then you also go some people step out in
the street and keep by bus.

Speaker 5 (44:58):
Like we've got our boys.

Speaker 6 (44:59):
They're both funny and lovable and smart, and you know
they'll try anything. They just give life a good go,
both of them do, and so we can ask for
every day if you wake up and they're doing that,
that's great.

Speaker 1 (45:13):
Part. What have you learned about your marriage? Because this
stuff puts a lot of pressure on relationships, and you've
you're coming up for your fourth year with two critical
situations with you boys.

Speaker 5 (45:27):
I've learned that.

Speaker 2 (45:28):
When we do both attack this in a really different way,
and I think we give each other respect for that.
Nicky goes into the detail and faces it front on,
whereas I hired and kind of pretend it hasn't happened,
and you know I don't.

Speaker 5 (45:42):
I've never gone into the detail. Nikki researches you.

Speaker 2 (45:45):
Reach I just kind of sit back and not pretend
it's all okay, but make myself feel better by not
going into the detail.

Speaker 5 (45:51):
So I think what we've learned is.

Speaker 1 (45:52):
Because it's too scary for you.

Speaker 2 (45:53):
Yeah, yeah, that we can't push the way I approach
it onto you and you can't push away.

Speaker 5 (45:58):
And we've found that space, right, you've never Yeah, I
think we've had a conversation about it.

Speaker 9 (46:03):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (46:03):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (46:04):
With Levi, we didn't. I think we just took that
into the situation. With Fletcher, you.

Speaker 1 (46:07):
Had a template, Yeah, I think so.

Speaker 2 (46:09):
Yeah, don't get me wrong that when we both see psychologists.

Speaker 5 (46:13):
Yeah, man, then thank god, that's amazing.

Speaker 6 (46:16):
Case problems here, doesn't hear my problems.

Speaker 5 (46:19):
We've got enough problems through it.

Speaker 1 (46:21):
But it's the teamwork that you clearly have because once
resentment or content starts to like you, guys have got
to be tight to hold up these boys.

Speaker 5 (46:32):
Yeah, you can.

Speaker 6 (46:33):
You can see how marriages will break up. Just yeah.
And you know what, it's even worse when people go
through this stuff and they're divorced and the children are
going through it, and.

Speaker 5 (46:41):
Then that adds another like yeah.

Speaker 6 (46:45):
Yeah, yeah, when you know a couple of each other
for ten years and also they're drawn together and.

Speaker 1 (46:49):
In the ic.

Speaker 6 (46:50):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, and they have to learn to communicate.
And there was times when if Pat was crying, you
just are so emotionally full. I just can't give you anything.

Speaker 5 (47:03):
I just can't do that. It's just, yeah, you do
go into yourself a little bit. We can.

Speaker 2 (47:08):
You're probably like too highways that are split by a
big pattern and we were just doing it and you still.

Speaker 5 (47:14):
Are still doing whatever it takes to get through.

Speaker 2 (47:16):
But the fact that our boys, the way they deal
with it makes it a thousand times.

Speaker 5 (47:21):
I know, yeat and they're funny.

Speaker 6 (47:23):
They sit in the kitchen and if they've got mates
over or anything, you know it to be like can
you get me a drink to one of their mates
and he'll be like, I'm in a wheelchair and.

Speaker 5 (47:31):
They your brothers because I'm blind. We're just saying that,
and again that's what that comes from Nikki, and it
breaks my heart. I'm like, I don't say that, but
that's this. It's that side of family that keep it normal.

Speaker 2 (47:48):
And yeah, we take anything front on and we've brought
the kids up like that from the start. It probably
comes back to what I said about me not really
knowing how the parent. We've taken the lead there so
open conversations, extremely liberal in sex and drugs and life,
and I think that set this up to.

Speaker 1 (48:05):
Be easier and a lot of piss taking. Yeah, because
that somehow makes I get that, because it's like all
things can't be that serious if everyone's still taking the
piss out of here. Because he's not an inspiration, I
can even say like that. He would not love the
you're an inspiration. That's not his vibe.

Speaker 6 (48:24):
Yeah, And even though we're disabled, it's like such, I
have a lot of trouble even saying that. I totally
get why people in chairs are wheelchair users or chair users.
It's because if you trick down the Goddess tomorrow and
you're in a chair, you're not all of a sudden disabled.

Speaker 5 (48:39):
Yeah, you know your chair users.

Speaker 1 (48:41):
It's not who he is. It's just like the color
of his hair.

Speaker 6 (48:44):
Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, So I get that, and I
think that's exactly what he thinks. And Lev doesn't see
himself as you know, having this syndrome that's going to
ruin the rest of his life. He's just each day
as it comes and with tomorrow's bad, we'll do with it.

Speaker 5 (48:59):
It's not great.

Speaker 1 (49:01):
Well, the luckiest thing is that they both have you
for parents. So well there, yeah, well done you.

Speaker 5 (49:06):
Yeah yeah, we are up next.

Speaker 1 (49:09):
The man at the center of all this, mister Fletcher Crowley,
who answered every question I asked with honesty, candor and
a big dose of good humor.

Speaker 9 (49:19):
I didn't know like how bad it was, like because
when I was in ICU, I sent a voice message
to one of my mates and like, can't film my
legs or move my legs, And I don't know how
long that's going to last. I've probably been here for
like a couple of weeks.

Speaker 1 (49:31):
Stay with us. Tell me about the tenth of September.
That day, I'm told it's one of the best days
you've ever had. Do you call it the track?

Speaker 9 (49:47):
They the tracks or the dirt jumps, that's what they're called.
But yeah, like it was up at Redhill. I don't know.
Me and my mates had been building this jump for
probably two months and this was like the first day.
It was like a proper big session.

Speaker 5 (49:59):
Get it.

Speaker 9 (50:03):
I was trying to double backflip and I'd done them
maybe three times at a mate's house up in Brisbane
or Byron, And yeah, I don't know. It was just
like everyone was there. The vibe was so good. I
did heaps of just single flips and I had heaps
of time, so I just I'll just go for it.
And I pretty much landed like four, but I kept
like sliding out kind of, and just me being selfish,

(50:24):
I was like, no, I need to roll away clean.

Speaker 1 (50:27):
You wanted to land like stick the landing, Yeah.

Speaker 9 (50:29):
Like properly roll away. But then I did one and
I just didn't pool hard enough for the two flips.
So I did one and then I threw my bike
and I just kept rotating and basically folded myself in half.

Speaker 1 (50:41):
At what point do you know, Oh, this isn't going
to end well because you've had a lot of falls,
a lot of you know, I imagine when you what do
you call it, dirt flip, dirt jumping, dirt jumping, I
imagine you land badly, not infrequently, particularly when you start
learning a trick.

Speaker 9 (50:59):
Yeah, like you crash all the time, but you can bail.
But the funny thing was, so I did like three
probably and like landed them, but washed out like I
said before, And then I did one and I did
one flip and then threw my bike. Wasn't rotaing quick enough,
and I kind of slowed my rotation down, so I
landed like on my back. Fit I was fine because
I had all back protection on the stuff. So I
just got up and tried again, landed one, but like

(51:20):
washed out again, and then I went for the next
one the sixth time, yeah, the sixth time probably, And yeah,
I just couldn't slow my rotation down enough, so I
just kept rotating and like basically like on my neck
and my head and just my legs folded over.

Speaker 1 (51:33):
And yeah, when you're flying through the air and you've
thrown your bike and you're trying to land in it
or position your body so that you don't injure yourself
for as little as possible in your land, do you
feel scared? Do you feel like, oh shit, is it dread?
Because you know what's coming? Like what is it?

Speaker 9 (51:52):
This particular trick is pretty hard to like save yourself
from if you're bailing, but like most tricks, you can
save yourself and like you kind of know you'll be fine.
But yeah, this time, I don't know. I don't really
remember much from going off the lip to lying on
the ground, Like, oh.

Speaker 1 (52:06):
You've watched the video though, haven't you.

Speaker 9 (52:07):
Yeah, I've watched you like heats of times.

Speaker 1 (52:09):
Why did you do that? Fletch' what? Like that must
have been a big deal to watch that moment.

Speaker 9 (52:14):
I don't know. I didn't watch it for like maybe
a month or two, and then I was just in
bed horse and I was like, I'm just gonna watch this.
So I watched and I was like, oh, that looks
like it hurt. And then I've got like all the
angles and like I've watched, I've like inspected it, and
I'm like, oh.

Speaker 1 (52:26):
Yeah, so you've watched it so much. You don't have
that you know. That's the moment my life changed forever.
It's not that kind of thing when you look at it.

Speaker 9 (52:36):
No, not even it's more just like, I mean, it
is like that's when my life changed forever. But it's
not like it doesn't scare me or anything like it
is what it is.

Speaker 1 (52:45):
When you hit the ground, What was your instinct try
and get up?

Speaker 5 (52:49):
Yeah?

Speaker 9 (52:49):
Well I tried to get up and then I was
just in the video you can hear me up like
there was silence, and I'm just like, oh fuck, fuck fuck,
And then all my mates is like just stay there,
don't move, don't move. And then two of the guys there,
Tom Wriggley and Wriggles, and Wriggles was there, Yeah, sausage.

Speaker 1 (53:03):
Is there, so everyone was there. There was like dozens
of people around like using the jump because it's a
great day out it.

Speaker 9 (53:10):
Yeah, there're heaps of kids there. Dad's then yeah, Jayden
and Riggles just came and like held my hands and
more like just don't move. I was like, get my
helmet off, and they're like, nah, don't move.

Speaker 1 (53:18):
How did they know?

Speaker 9 (53:19):
We all worked at a bike park in brook Fell
together called Big Air and we had to do like
first aid courses and stuff for that, so we all
knew like not to move me. But I was just like, no,
take my ownt off, but they wouldn't let me. And
I just remember I was holding Jayden's hand and Wriggles's
arm and I was just like this is so fucked.
And Riggles just like closed his eyes and looked like
he was just like this isn't good.

Speaker 1 (53:37):
And I was like, oh, did it hurt?

Speaker 9 (53:40):
I don't remember being in any pain, but I'm shum
so yeah, but yeah, I don't know because everyone's saying
when they have a spinal cord injury. It absolutely kills
and like I shaddered like till my vertebraes and like
dislocated them. So you'd think so, but I don't remember
any pain.

Speaker 1 (53:54):
Do you remember speaking to your dad on the phone
when Sausage.

Speaker 9 (53:57):
Called him vaguely, like very vaguely, yeah, because I think
I asked someone spine. I was like, can I call
my dad? And I think it was a coals or something,
and I was like, oh, Dad, I've had a bit
of a crash. Because I hate scaring him, So he
didn't think much of it. He was just like, oh,
come up as soon as I can. And then he,
I think called Mum and Mum and Leva in one
of Leva's mates, Tom came up and yeah, I think
they worked it out when they got there.

Speaker 1 (54:18):
You can often tell a lot by looking in other
people's faces and watching their body language and just seeing
what's going on. What was your experience in the hour
and a half or so that you were lying there,
not moving, Like, what could you see in other people's
faces and their behavior?

Speaker 9 (54:33):
Oh, everyone was just like worried. Like one of the
mom's Candice, just got up there and she was she's
a nurse or she was like almost a registered nurse then,
and she was like just looking after me and just
like but I could tell everyone was freaked out, And yeah,
were you.

Speaker 1 (54:47):
Aware pretty quickly that you couldn't move your legs?

Speaker 5 (54:49):
Yeah?

Speaker 9 (54:50):
And I couldn't feel them at all either at the start,
So I was like, this is so weird.

Speaker 1 (54:54):
Yeah, did you know in that moment?

Speaker 9 (54:56):
Yeah, I knew, Yeah, definitely. I didn't know like how
bad it was, like, because I when I was in ICU,
I sent a voice message to one of my mates
and like I listened to it the other day and
I was like, oh, I can't film my legs or
move my legs, and I don't know how long that's
going to last. I've probably been here for like a
couple of weeks, so I didn't know much.

Speaker 1 (55:15):
Do you remember them taking you out because it was
like a dirt track? Was that I remember?

Speaker 9 (55:20):
I was like when I was on the ground, apparently
at the moment, it's like you're making heaps of jokes
and just like talking shit, and one of the nurses
came and this is like the thing I remember very
clearly from the day. She was holding my head like
because supporting my neck and I was like, why am
I looking up your nose? So it's like the main
thing I remember. And then the whole way getting carried
to the ambulance and then getting driven to hospital, I

(55:40):
was like just staring.

Speaker 1 (55:42):
Straight up at it because she was leaning over here exactly.
So it was those little things that have stuck in
your memory about that day.

Speaker 9 (55:49):
I don't remember much visual at all. I remember all
the sounds in the talking.

Speaker 1 (55:53):
Did you overhear what people were saying about you?

Speaker 9 (55:56):
Not really, no, I say that I remember all the sounds,
but like, I just remember a lot more sound than
visual stuff.

Speaker 1 (56:03):
You got to the hospital, you had to have surgery,
so it's all probably a bit of a blur. When
you woke up, that's always a bit of a groggy time.
What are your first conscious memories after the surgery.

Speaker 9 (56:15):
I remember getting a video from this guy called Prudy.
He's a moto writer from Camber and Filmer, and he
sent me a video only it was like a minute long,
but at the end he's like, this injury happened for you,
not too And I've watched that video like heaps of
times since, and that's probably the first thing.

Speaker 1 (56:29):
I remember what did he mean by that?

Speaker 9 (56:32):
He meant that, like, everything happens for a reason, and
I'll make the best out of it. I guess.

Speaker 1 (56:37):
Yeah, your dad was saying that you have only seemed
to be angry for like about an hour where you
sort of went, I hate bikes. I'm just gonna use
my camera now. Do you remember that moment?

Speaker 9 (56:51):
Vaguely? I remember one night in ICU, me and him
were so angry. We had like a stressful and we
were just taking turns of squeezing and like we were
super frustrated. But besides that, not I think that was
just maybe second night or something. But then after that,
I was just like, it is what it is?

Speaker 1 (57:05):
What about feeling sorry for yourself?

Speaker 9 (57:07):
Not even like I was doing something I love. I
was like I say to people, I was asking for it,
but I wasn't asking for it.

Speaker 1 (57:14):
But it sounds like victim blame you.

Speaker 9 (57:17):
I mean I was doing something dangerous, like yeah, right,
Like there's some people in rehab who just were like
body surfing or in motorbike crash something, and I feel
like that'd be really hard because it's not your fault.

Speaker 1 (57:28):
So you kind of took responsibility for it and you
owned it.

Speaker 9 (57:31):
Yeah, I guess yeah, yeah right.

Speaker 1 (57:34):
Was there a moment that someone came to you and said, dude,
you're not going to probably not going to walk? Is
that what they say? I mean in the movies they do,
How does it work in real life?

Speaker 9 (57:43):
Most of the doctors were just like there's like, yeah,
you won't walk again, Like you've got to adapt to
life in a chair for the rest of your life.
But one doctor came into ICU and he's like, you
can show us what you can do now, and I
think that's that's the one doctor we really like listened
like after that, like we were like, yeah, we'll show
them what we can.

Speaker 1 (57:59):
Do as opposed to hear all the things exactly.

Speaker 5 (58:02):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (58:02):
Do you remember the first person who said to you
you're not going to walk again?

Speaker 9 (58:06):
Not really, no, I just remember like there was this
one doctor when I was in the spinal world at
North Shaw and he was just like, he said, because
you're going to be in a chair forever, tried to
tell me how to do everything, and I was like
I might be but I might.

Speaker 2 (58:18):
Not be right.

Speaker 1 (58:20):
So you didn't have that kind of existential moment of
oh my god. It was just sort of a slow
doing understanding.

Speaker 9 (58:28):
It was just slowly building up and I was like, oh, yeah,
here we are.

Speaker 1 (58:32):
Did you have to sort of grieve for the life
that you won't have and the things that you won't
be able to do even in the just the immediate,
you know, like going on the ski trip to Japan
with your dad.

Speaker 9 (58:47):
Not really like if anything. Probably more recently I realized
what I can't do, But I'm like, there's so many
things I can do still.

Speaker 1 (58:54):
Yeah, what are the big bummers that you can't do?

Speaker 9 (58:57):
Camping's really hard?

Speaker 1 (58:59):
Like that's not what I expected you to say, and
it would not be on the top of my list
of things I was sad about not doing. Yeah, I
don't know.

Speaker 9 (59:06):
It's like you think, like writing and like skiing and stuff. Yeah,
like the bike so you can get thor the bike
I'm getting. It's like so high tech. I'm like just
so excited to get it, and like skiing, it just
looks like so much fun.

Speaker 1 (59:19):
Right, So there's all these things you're looking forward to, Yeah,
like new toys. Yeah, exactly, that's it. Your mates have
been like I've followed you since pretty much the day
it happened, and you know, I know your parents. I've
been so struck by your mates. I haven't known their names,
but Sausage and wriggles Now and Leroy. I'm just so

(59:40):
into all of them. Your parents were saying that. One
of the first things, almost helpful thing that one of
the social workers said is he's seventeen. He needs his
phone and his mates. Now what did your mates do
when they first saw you.

Speaker 9 (59:54):
One of my mates Jet, He's like, if you meet Jet,
you'll just be like he's an idiot, Like he jokes
about everything. And he came in and like we have
this thing called day for It.

Speaker 1 (01:00:05):
Day for It.

Speaker 9 (01:00:06):
Yeah, and like then you changed the Dave Ferret again
into the hospital, filmed around the room and he's like
day for It, and then filmed me and Icy and
I'm like fully out of it.

Speaker 1 (01:00:17):
So day for It meaning like this is great and
like obviously it wasn't great because you're a nicer unconscious.

Speaker 9 (01:00:23):
Yeah, but he's just taking the piss out of you. Yeah, exactly,
and I love it. Like he still does it all
the time.

Speaker 1 (01:00:28):
Like it was funny when I when I look at
your Instagram and you know, you share all these different
things that you're doing like bloody pull ups in your
chair and you know, crawling like all these amazing things.
And it's really funny when you read the comments underneath,
because half of it is your friend's taking the piss,
oh yeah, and then half of it is like probably
I would say your parents' friends like quite earnest, like

(01:00:49):
you're so inspiring, fletch, keep on going. And it just
strikes me that that's not really your vibe, like you're
so inspirational, Like how do you react to when people
say that shit to you?

Speaker 9 (01:01:03):
I don't know, like I like it mean, well, like
it's really nice to see, Yeah, yeah, it's good. But
then I do, like all my mates, it is fully
like your seed jets. He just takes a pierce out
of everything.

Speaker 1 (01:01:16):
Who were the people in ICU? You know you were
the youngest and the most mobile. Yeah, suddenly you all
had this thing in common. Or you know, in the
in the hospital for the seventy seven days that you
were there in the spinal unit, who are some of
the people that you meet, Like you kind of stood
out in there. I imagine I.

Speaker 9 (01:01:34):
Met a guy called Bob who I've like stained really
close with.

Speaker 1 (01:01:36):
I'm obsessed with Bob. Can you can you tell everyone
about Bob? Bob.

Speaker 9 (01:01:39):
He's like a seventy six year old guy. He was
opening his boot and it hit him in the head
and he took a step back and then he just
fell back and broke his back.

Speaker 1 (01:01:49):
I wondered what had happened to Bob.

Speaker 9 (01:01:51):
Yeah, yeah, so he was in the hospital for a
bit longer than me. Oh, probably in north Shore for
about the same time, but then he left right a
week after I did. And he's at a nursing home now,
so go and visit him sometimes.

Speaker 1 (01:02:03):
So you guys became mates. Yeah, yeah, how did you
bond with?

Speaker 9 (01:02:07):
Day for it?

Speaker 1 (01:02:09):
In the field?

Speaker 9 (01:02:10):
He comes in, he just stuck the finger off of me,
and I was like, Oh, I like this guy.

Speaker 1 (01:02:14):
Because is there a lot of sort of reverence and
like I imagine some people, probably not the people at
work in the hospital, but people can be like, oh,
fletch you okay, and it strikes me that that's just
not what you're into.

Speaker 9 (01:02:32):
Like even still people coming like, oh, I'm sorry, sorry
to hear what happened to you, And I don't want
to tell him not to say that, but I'm just like, oh,
it's all good. I don't know what to say. Is
kind of awkward, but I get why they're saying it
at the same time.

Speaker 1 (01:02:42):
Yeah, what are some of the other people that you
met in ride?

Speaker 9 (01:02:46):
In ride, I met a younger guy or those two
young guys called Pete and Zach. Became pretty close with them,
and they're still there, So yeah, there are people. There
was a guy called Marcus at North Shore. He's still there.
I became good mates with him. He fell off his balcony,
I think so.

Speaker 1 (01:03:01):
Yeah, for most people who are in the spinal unit,
I imagine it's like a sliding doors moment, like this
thing happened out of the blue and my life changed.
Do they give you lots of counseling to kind of
deal with that?

Speaker 9 (01:03:14):
Yeah, they offer it definitely, But I was kind of like,
I feel like my counseling was just making it fun.
Like I used to. Towards the end, I would stay
off till like two am with the night shift nurses
playing UNO. I got in trouble at the hospital because
there was a huge Christmas tree. Me Jaden and Leroy
pushed it and pushed it against a balcony, so then
we hung and get silly sign on the top of it.

Speaker 1 (01:03:36):
Can you explain what gets silly is?

Speaker 9 (01:03:38):
It was a probably February twenty twenty three. I got
it tattooed on my thigh and mom and dad didn't know.
And then when I was dropping in to do the
trick accident on, I still was screaming out, get silly.

Speaker 1 (01:03:52):
Really.

Speaker 9 (01:03:53):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:03:53):
When you say I was dropping in as you were falling, No.

Speaker 9 (01:03:57):
No, like as I was there's long running. As I
was on the run in, yeah, I was.

Speaker 5 (01:04:01):
Like, get silly.

Speaker 9 (01:04:01):
And then I was like, oh, so it's just.

Speaker 1 (01:04:02):
Like a kind of a war cry among your friends,
and it's like the thing that you say.

Speaker 9 (01:04:06):
Yeah, me and one of my mates Aiden he kind
of started it to be honest like, and then I
just kept saying it. So Mom and dad didn't know
about the tattoo. But in ICU like rolling me to
make sure I don't get pressure saws and stuff, and Mum.
I told the nurses that mom and dad didn't know.
So Mum walks in and she's like what is that
And I'm like nothing, and the nurse quickly puts a
sheet over her.

Speaker 1 (01:04:28):
Yeah. I feel like, you know, you probably had a
good get out of jail. Free card to not get
out of trouble at that stage. And Dad was like,
why didn't you just tell us we wouldn't care. I
was like, I don't know, you might have. How did
the tattoo gun get smuggled into the hospital?

Speaker 9 (01:04:42):
Took it in like a Woolye's bag so they didn't
know what it was. And then I had to like
steal wet wipes from from the storage room so I
could like use it to wipe the ink off.

Speaker 1 (01:04:52):
But yeah, which you and your friends have just started
tattooing each other.

Speaker 9 (01:04:55):
Yeah, well I did, Like I've probably tatted like thirty
people with get silly like it definitely doesn't look professional,
but it's got personality.

Speaker 1 (01:05:02):
It's like you, yea, when you were thinking about your
future before the accident, how did you think about your future?
Like what did you imagine that it would look like?

Speaker 9 (01:05:13):
I knew I wanted to have a gap here and
I wanted to move to New Zealand or Whistler in Canada,
But after that I had no idea.

Speaker 1 (01:05:20):
To ski to ride in that moment that things changed. Now,
have you just kind of gone, oh well that might
not happen, or have you just not even changed your
plans and your thoughts about the future.

Speaker 9 (01:05:33):
I've definitely changed my plans, Like I didn't like, I
had no idea before, but now I want to ride
from Perth to Sydney next year, just because why not
ride on what? An adaptive bike, an adaptive around a bike,
or any sort of bike.

Speaker 1 (01:05:46):
Whatever's easiest, whatever's easiest. I love that there's an easiest
option when you're talking about riding a bike as a
paraplegic from one end of the country to the other. Yeah,
sounds like it'll be super easy.

Speaker 9 (01:05:58):
Well, yeah, some of them would just be easy to
pedal with my arms and someone will be harder.

Speaker 1 (01:06:01):
So your mum talked about the moment that she was
looking at your toes and telling you to do some stuff.
Can you describe what happened that night?

Speaker 9 (01:06:11):
She had asked me, probably like twice a week she
would ask me. She's like, try to move your toes
and I'm like, mom, it's not going to work, and
she's like, just try it. And then she was naming
and she's like this one's Burt and this one's Ernie.
It's like try move and I was like, oh whatever,
And I tried to move them. They just like wiggled
and she's like no way, Like she just put her
hands over her mouth and was like, no way, and
do it again. I was like, oh my god, that's crazy.

(01:06:32):
But yeah, I'm going to be straight up, I never
thought i'd be this obsessed with my toes. But that's
a fucking big step in the right direction. But yeah,
it's pretty crazy.

Speaker 1 (01:06:42):
And so what did they tell you about the fact
that you could move your toes? What did it mean?

Speaker 9 (01:06:47):
Because you're going to think called spinal shock for the
first three months or something, and yeah, they're like, you're
probably just coming out of spinal shock. So some people
might not have any movement for the first three months
and then they'll have heaps. They like, you're coming out
of spinal shock, and more might come back. I might
just stay like this. And they didn't really know. It's
kind of so you.

Speaker 1 (01:07:05):
Can move your toes, but how does the message get
to your toes? But like not your knees and like
places before that.

Speaker 9 (01:07:11):
Your spinal cord is like magic, it's what part gets damaged,
Like Okay, it's like one side might get damaged more
than the other, Like my right leg has a lot
more feeling than my left legs, so I must have
damaged the they cross actually the feeling so like I
must have damaged my left side more to make my
right side have more feeling.

Speaker 1 (01:07:28):
Do you feel like pantom pains?

Speaker 9 (01:07:32):
Not really, I have constant like it's like burning, Like
my feet just seel like they're burning. But it's kind
of weird. It's only when I say they are now right,
like if I think about it, like now they're burning,
But if I'm not thinking about it kind of just
goes away.

Speaker 1 (01:07:45):
How much movement have you regained?

Speaker 9 (01:07:47):
Oh? Fair, But like I can kick my leg out
like and then I can lift my leg up a
little bit. I can't really control any of the speed
or like yeah, stop it or anything, but it's a movement.

Speaker 1 (01:07:58):
What's been the part that's been the most annoying Probably
like the bower care and bladder.

Speaker 9 (01:08:05):
It's just never.

Speaker 8 (01:08:06):
Right, not having control, Yeah, because your bowel and bladder
are so like to go to the bathroom, I have
to put a catheterin. Yeah, and then that gets a
high risk of UTIs and stuff. So that's just frustrating.

Speaker 5 (01:08:18):
But it is.

Speaker 1 (01:08:18):
But then does it hurt if you can't feel it?
Does it hurt.

Speaker 9 (01:08:21):
I have a feeling from my injury down. It's just
very different, Like I don't feel pain or temperature or
sharpness or softness or anything, so like it doesn't really hurt.

Speaker 1 (01:08:30):
No, can I ask you a question that you just
don't have to answer. I imagine you're a seventeen year old guy,
you're a handsome rooster. Romantic situations in the future.

Speaker 9 (01:08:39):
Yeah, it works.

Speaker 1 (01:08:40):
So I'm lucky it works. Fletcher, I'm so happy.

Speaker 9 (01:08:44):
Thank you.

Speaker 1 (01:08:45):
I imagine that was like a big deal to know that
whether that was going to be the case.

Speaker 9 (01:08:49):
Yeah, a few of the I don't even know whatever.
A few people in the North Shore came in and
spoke about and yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:08:54):
Yeah, right, So you don't see that there's anything in
your future, whether it's becoming a parent or doing that
kind of stuff. Oh my god, I can't believe you're
young enough to be my son. Don't worry. I talk
to my son about sex too, he hates it. Nothing's
off the table in that, not really, Like, yeah, there's
ways to do.

Speaker 9 (01:09:13):
Everything exactly that you want to do everything.

Speaker 1 (01:09:15):
And skiing or having a family, yeah exactly. So has
it been a case of learning to do things differently,
Like what have you had to learn to do?

Speaker 9 (01:09:25):
Yeah, more just like transfers, getting out of my chair
onto the floor, back into my chair, all that stuff.
That was just like phisy. I was going twice a
day for like the three months in north Shore, then
once a day at ride and I guess yeah, that
those whole six months I was learning so much just
how to do everything.

Speaker 1 (01:09:40):
And at home. You put up a video the other
day of you getting in and out of your chair
and then you could crawl a bit on the floor. Yeah.

Speaker 9 (01:09:47):
Yeah, so because I can lift my leg up, like
I said, like, yeah, if I'm on all fours, I
can bring it forward, so I can crawl and stuff
like that. But it's definitely not the quickest way. If
I don't have a chair, normally, I'll just sit on
my bum and just use my hands and like push
myself along.

Speaker 1 (01:10:00):
But yeah, you know you've seen your brother go through
a lot, LEVI over the years. Was this just a
very elaborate way to pull focus from him and get
more of your parents?

Speaker 5 (01:10:09):
Yeah?

Speaker 9 (01:10:09):
That was my plan. I was like, stuff, is this
guy I need more attention?

Speaker 1 (01:10:14):
How has he been in terms of just the different
ways that your family has reacted.

Speaker 9 (01:10:19):
I think we've gotten a lot closer. I remember he
came into ICU and he just like was in there
for like thirty seconds and had to leave. He just
like couldn't stand it. But before my injury, we used
to like we didn't really argue, but we just app
used to talk to each other. And yeah, but like
now like we'll go out together or he's always like
let me know if you need anything if he's out,
or like I can help with anything.

Speaker 1 (01:10:39):
It seems like your friends. They don't tiptoe around you.

Speaker 9 (01:10:43):
Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Speaker 1 (01:10:44):
No special treatment, no.

Speaker 9 (01:10:46):
Special treatment or the only thing the only special treat
may gain is like front seat and car.

Speaker 1 (01:10:50):
Oh that's good.

Speaker 9 (01:10:51):
You don't have to like it makes transfers easier and
school and they'll just take the piss out of me.

Speaker 1 (01:10:57):
You still have to go though, Yeah, I still have
to go and do your HC. Yeah, and then what.

Speaker 9 (01:11:02):
And then who knows? A gap year and then I
think I might god a UNI, but we'll see.

Speaker 1 (01:11:08):
The Crowley family came in to Mum and Maya on
a Friday morning a couple of weeks ago, and to
be honest, I really didn't want them to leave watching
the way that they interacted with each other with so
much warmth and love after everything they've been through. I mean,
they're all a bit knackered. Clearly, it's been a lot,
it's been a time, it's been emotional, it's been a rollercoaster.

(01:11:29):
But they're really solid, you know. And I should also
add it's important to add this that the kinds of
questions that I ask in a No Filter interview are
in no way appropriate to ask in real life. Please
remember that, Please don't ask people who use wheelchairs about
their sex lives or how they go to the bathroom.
That stuff is intensely personal. And I'm only allowed to

(01:11:50):
ask because I'm on a podcast called No Filter. And
you should also know that even I know when I've
possibly pushed it too far. And so I reached out
to Fletch afterwards, I slid into his DMS on Insta
to apologize for asking him about his sex life. I mean,
how awkward for that poor poor young man. Has he

(01:12:11):
not suffered enough? And I said, of course that I
would take out anything that he was uncomfortable with, and
he actually responded straight away. He was like, hahaha, no worries,
he said, it's the question he gets asked most often
about sex. I mean, he's a seventeen year old boy,
so I imagine his mates probably ask him that all
the time, and he said that he was happy to
answer it, and maybe now people will stop asking him

(01:12:33):
if they listen to the podcast. So Fletch, You're welcome. Seriously,
what a young man and also what an amazing content creator.
Follow him on social he just makes such great content,
so I highly recommend you follow him and see what
he's getting up to because it's also just very funny.
Speaking of funny, he started a foundation, because of course

(01:12:54):
he did. It's called Get Silly, and it's to raise
money for spinal cord research and rehab. If you want
to support it, you don't have to get a tattoo
like Fletch and all his mates. He has jumpers and
t shirts on his website, which we've linked to in
the show notes. This Cracker of An episode was produced
by Kimberly Bradish and Juiam Moylan, with sound production by

(01:13:16):
Leah Porgies. I'm Maya Friedman and go Get Silly.

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Extra: The Day 17-Year-Old Fletcher Crowley Became Paraplegic

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