In the spring of 2021, Charlotte Florence was on a break from her office job in London, surfing in Costa Rica for several months, when she had an accident which left doctors in doubt about whether she would ever be able to walk again. Here, she explains her journey to recovery, against all odds.
In January 2022, I had to sell every pair of shoes I owned, except for one pair of Vans and my Birkenstock Arizonas. Shoes had always been what I spent my money on – my jeans size might change, but these would always fit, I reasoned. As I packed up my favourite Jimmy Choo platforms, and the shoes I had bought in Paris to celebrate getting my first job, tears trickled onto the cardboard boxes. My spinal cord injury had made these once treasured items relics of my old life.
I was in a hospital bed alone when I was told with certainty that I would “never walk again”. The effect of those three words was somehow more crushing than the quad bike that had tumbled over my back in Costa Rica a month earlier. It might sound like a cliché, but I had woken up that morning in March 2021 with a funny feeling that something was off. I hadn’t slept well, but thought a sunrise surf would help me shake it off. I spent 15 minutes frantically searching for the keys to my quad bike, before giving up and messaging a friend to ask for a lift in his car. As I walked down the driveway to meet him, I suddenly spotted the keys there on the bike – they had been under my helmet on top of the seat all along. I decided to drive myself – a decision I would replay over and over again in the months that followed. Why didn’t I go with my friend?
It was still dark, and the roads were empty but for a few surfers making their way to the shore and construction workers on a site nearby. I remember the gentle breeze through my hair as I drove steadily along the track, then one strong gust of wind that pushed back my helmet. I mustn’t have secured the clasp tightly enough. The second I took my left hand off the handlebars to readjust it, I knew I had made a big mistake. The bike immediately lost balance, and I was catapulted off the seat into the jungle that lined the road.
Beyond that first line of trees was a steep descent. My helmet had fallen off, so I put my arms in a brace position as I rolled down the slope, over the dead leaves coating the forest floor. With every flip, I glimpsed the quad bike hurtling towards me, gathering speed with each rotation. I knew it was going to hit me.
The pain was indescribable. I was fortunate to not take its full weight, but the impact I felt when the bike collided with my back is not something I can put into words. I lay face down, unable to move, and screamed for my life. I screamed and screamed and screamed into the darkness. I had fallen so deep into the undergrowth, I was certain I was going to die in this tropical paradise. But I kept screaming. It felt like a sword had slashed my torso and severed me in two. I couldn’t feel my legs. I had no idea if I was bleeding.
After about 50 minutes, I heard footsteps crunching through the leaves. Against all odds, two builders on their way to work had found me.
It might sound strange, but I now feel lucky that I remember every minute detail of what happened. The strange sounds of the jungle waking up, the words exchanged by the men who found me, my friends’ ashen faces when they arrived, the screeching sirens, the tiles of the hospital ceiling I stared at for weeks – it helped me to process what had happened to me. At the time, all I could say again and again was, “Why didn’t I get in that car?” and, “That stupid helmet.” “You’ll be OK,” people told me, but their voices were shaky – unconvinced.
At the hospital in Costa Rica, the emphasis was always on hope – even when it was impossible to find. They are spiritual people who helped me try and remain positive even through my constant tears. Initially, getting home to the UK seemed like the biggest obstacle – one of my insurance policies had expired, so I had to raise $150,000 to cover the cost of surgeries and travel.
It would have been impossible to fund this myself, but my family and friends helped to raise over £90,000. My repatriation was further complicated by lockdown travel restrictions, and flight routes that no longer existed due to Covid. But eventually, after four long weeks, I made it back to East London, in a hospital ward only 1.4 miles from my flat.
Unlike in Costa Rica, the medics in London were careful to avoid giving me false hope. Up until that point, I’d been told nothing about my injuries or the outcome of my surgeries – “maybe” and “we’ll see” was all I’d heard. Now I was hearing “no”, and “probably not”. I asked one physio directly if I would walk again. She pulled up a seat close to my bed and told me to give up on the idea of walking. “Don’t try and find miracle stories,” she said. “But my knee can move an inch to the left and right?” I protested, through tears. “That’s just a spasm,” she said.
It wasn’t just a spasm. I know now that spinal cord injuries are complex, and in trauma units like that one, they rarely see the results of long-term rehabilitation, and what is possible if your spinal cord isn’t completely damaged. After four weeks in that hospital, I was transferred to the London Spinal Cord Injury Centre. The team there didn’t know if I would be able to walk again either, but I wanted them to say “we don’t know” rather than “never”. I stayed for three months and worked consistently in the gym, trying to rebuild the broken connection between my brain and my legs.
While it still looks and smells like a hospital, the centre has the most beautiful private garden. This oasis is where we all learned how to be in a wheelchair for the first time. It was there, on a path lined with flowers, that I met other people who were navigating similar injuries to me. During afternoons spent talking to each other in the fresh air, surrounded by the smell of lavender and geraniums rather than disinfectant, I slowly began to feel safe again. I began to heal.
It was in the gym at the centre that I took my first steps since the accident. I walked five steps forwards, and five steps backwards in a pair of Nike trainers, crying the whole time. Six weeks (and 60 physio sessions) later, I stood back at the front door of my old flat. I had been told living here in a wheelchair would be impossible due to the stairs, but here I was with my suitcase from Costa Rica, flanked by two crutches. Somehow, I had finally made it home.
Still, the reality of living in London with a disability is a harsh one. People stare and ask what happened to you when they see you in a wheelchair or with crutches. Once, while buying an iced coffee, a stranger came up to me and told me not to worry, that Jesus would cure me. Getting around is a constant struggle; people bash into you, and I now spend more on taxis in a month than I ever did shopping in my former life. Wherever I am now, I will always notice someone on crutches, with a walking stick or in a wheelchair.
My rehab was long and painful, but I refused to give up. I used every small improvement as encouragement to keep going. Standing up in the shower. Walking to the gates of my apartment building without crutches. Flying to Ireland for my friend’s wedding. Getting back on my surfboard. In those early days at home, I wanted my old life back more than anything. But as I slowly ticked off my goals, I realised that I needed to start following a different path.
Two years after my injury, I walked up Snowdon – part of a group of 50 people, many of whom had spinal cord injuries, with the Millimetres 2 Mountains charity (of which I’m now a beneficiary). I wore the ugliest hiking boots – boots you’d never imagine would be mentioned in Vogue. But these are the shoes that helped me not just to walk, but to walk up a mountain. They now mean so much more to me than my first Jimmy Choos, or any of the other pairs I boxed up to sell that day. I am now able to walk, and so my disability is less visible – but, in truth, it’s unlikely high heels will ever be able to support my feet after the nerve damage from the accident. I also have muscle atrophy in both legs caused by the paralysis, which takes a long time to reverse, and as the feet are the furthest point from the brain, it makes it harder to reform the connection to control them. For now, I have high arches and toes that grip to keep me standing, because my balance is still challenged.
It was so misty on the ascent to Snowdon that I could only see one or two steps ahead of me. Each step caused searing nerve pain, and I was the slowest in the group by far. When I approached the top, the rest of the crew had lined up to wait for me – they wanted me to lead the final steps to the summit. I had been holding back tears all day, but when I put my hands onto that summit marker, I completely collapsed.
It felt unbelievably poetic that, as we made our way down, the fog and clouds cleared. It was as though a voice was saying, “You have done it – now you can see.” “That is so far,” I exclaimed, looking down the snaking path in complete wonder at what I had just achieved. That valley was the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen, and it’s those incredibly ugly boots that helped get me up there.
