Perspective: Your Life Doesn’t Suck!

Need a little context on what you might call your "problems"?

You hardly need me to remind you that life swings up, it swings down, back and forth and then you die. We make good decisions, we make bad decisions, love is found and love is lost. Sometimes we walk around with pain so heavy it catches in your throat and compresses your chest. Other times we dance and float.

But, nothing, no love affair gone awry, or job lost, no betrayal or game thrown away in extra-time is existential. You take it on the chin. You move on.

And, yet, sometimes it is bad. Sometimes there isn’t a motivational speech in the world that can alter your perspective.

One year ago, Burleigh Heads surfer Rob Croll was paralysed when he fell headfirst into the sand bottom at Kirra.

“The wave was one of the waves you put hamsters on or guinea pigs. It was tiny, you know,” he told the GC Bulletin at the time. “I was face down in the water — it was clear blue — and I could see my arms waving around. I tried to move and I could move my arms. I couldn’t move my legs. Then I couldn’t roll over. This is happening second by second… It was peaceful, hey. You know how they talk about it being peaceful. It was about 30 seconds where I was doing that drowning. After that it’s just blank. Clear blue water, you could just see what was going on.”

An off-duty paramedic pulled him out of the water and Rob knew he was going to be a quadriplegic.

“I cried like a baby for a month,” he said.

Two days ago, a regional Australian newspaper reported on Rob’s rehabilitation. Mostly these sorta stories talk about how the subject soars above his disability, inspiring others, launching books, movies. 

This ain’t one of ’em.

(From the South Burnett Times)

Rob Croll knows the story you’d love to read, the one about the young father adjusting to life as a quadriplegic with boundless positivity and a constant smile on his dial.

The only catch is Rob’s too honest to tell that tale.

“I’m not embarrassed to admit I struggle mentally,” the 35-year-old said a year since he was paralysed in a surfing accident at Kirra.

“I’ve actually sought help, which I’m fine with you publishing as it may raise awareness about people seeking help with their mental health. I sometimes feel I’m a burden to my family because I’ve changed their entire life for the rest of my life.”

Twelve months ago Rob was living his dream at Burleigh Heads. A plumber by trade, he had a good job, a vibrant social life, a beautiful wife and two gorgeous little boys.

Then came Kirra and after eight months in the spinal ward of Brisbane’s Princess Alexandra Hospital, he now finds himself living a new reality on the Sunshine Coast.

“My grandfather had an empty house and with Mum and Dad up here too, we felt it was the right move,” Rob explained.

“It’s eased the financial burden and the family network has been instrumental in us adjusting to life with an injury like this, but we now think it might be more of a temporary move.

“It’s been particularly hard for (my wife) Katie because she had quite a buzzing social life down the Coast.”

Rob met Czech-born Katie while living in London a decade ago and, as he puts it: “She fell victim to my clutches.”

Now, more than ever, she’s also his rock.

“I always knew she was solid but I can’t believe how great she’s been,” he said. “We have a carer come every morning to help me get going but otherwise she helps me through the day and puts me to bed. I couldn’t have got through this without her.”

The couple has two sons – Rafe, 5, and Bowie, 3 – and Rob doesn’t hold back when asked to reflect on them.

“Through everything I’ve lost, the thing that upsets me the most is that connection with my kids,” he said. “At their age, that connection with fathers is typically a physical thing more than a spoken one. They need to be shown how to do things rather than told and I get frustrated because I have to try to tell my eldest boy how to do things instead of show him.”

In a bid to ease that burden, Rob has undergone revolutionary surgery in recent months that he hopes will provide him with greater use of his hands.

“It was a big decision because some people I spoke to were dead against it and some people were all for it,” he said of the procedure that saw nerves and tendons in his arm used to “rewire” his hands.

“It was a bit of a cruel trick (after the accident) that I was able to use my arms but not my hands … (but) we’ve seen the first signs of improvement. I’ve now got some movement in my right fingers, which helps with picking things up.

“The goal is to be able to grab a stubby with one hand instead of two – among other things, of course.”

As for returning to the water he loved so much, that box has already been ticked.

“It was mixed emotions,” Rob said of trialling – and ultimately ordering – a beach wheelchair.

“That feeling of going under a wave and popping out the other side is nearly indescribable and while it was nice to be back in the water, the mediocrity of being in a wheelchair as opposed to what I used to do was bittersweet.”

Read more here. 

(And if you want to help Rob and his fam out, click here for his mycause page. They’re thirty-five k in towards a 100k target.)

And, now, it might be time to rewatch Tyrone Swan and Pascale Honore and their magical, wonderful creation of duct-tape surfing.