Hi, my name's Simon Bartlett and I'm 25 years old.
In October 2007, I went down to the beach dove under wave and broke my neck.
And then I was in hospital for five and a half months.
Two or three hours into it, a doctor comes in and gets your family.
He's like, well, Simon's going to be a quadriplegic for the rest of his life.
And at that point, you kind of get a big shock and you don't know what's next.
And you get into rehab and you're like, you know, what's this life going to be like?
And it can be pretty scary and, you know, there's definitely moments where I was scared and
you just keep pushing through and as long as you have more up days and down days,
you know, that's kind of like a good thing.
Looking to see what I could do, not what I couldn't do, like a focus on, you know,
this is what I can do, not, well, I can't do this, I can't do this, I can't do that.
Wilshire Rugby, I was out of hospital, I think, for almost a year or something around that.
And they're like, here's a rugby chair, jump in and have a go.
And you're like, OK, yeah, and you just jump in and the guys go a bit soft on you.
So you're all right, you're too hard.
Wilshire Rugby used to be called Murder Ball.
When it became an international sport, they really couldn't, you know, advertise Murder Ball
for the change of Wilshire Rugby.
But it's basically a cross between NFL and ice hockey.
Play on a regular size basketball court, four on four.
And the basic objective of the game is to get the ball and with the ball,
cross the line, which is one point.
The first time in Wilshire Rugby was pretty scary.
Because you feel very, when you're first in hospital, you feel very fragile.
But once you're comfortable, don't just let loose.
The best way to get into it is just do it and get a couple of hits under your belt.
I guess Wilshire Rugby has been good something to look forward to, which is fun.
And also a great place to meet other people that are very similar to myself,
a lot of other quadriplegic where you have a community,
something that you can relate to and with and understand.
You can get on the court and everyone's equal and everyone's just going for it and having fun.
The focus isn't on your ability or disability, the focus is on the sport.
I think for newly disabled people, my advice would be to focus on what you can do
and know what if, so don't think what if I did that or what if I did that.
Either do it or just don't worry about it.
You can get very depressed and very down looking back and saying this is what I could have done
or this is what I've done in the past whatever, but just don't focus on that.
Focus on what you can do and life's new opportunities and life still can happen.
There's no limitations to what you want to do, so just go for it.
