It took just a moment for cyclist Kerryn Harvey’s life to change forever. She tells Melissa Heagney her amazing story of survival and about her passion for riding.
It was a warm January afternoon in 2013 when keen cyclist Kerryn Harvey and her partner Renee decided to head back to their hotel after a day of riding through the Adelaide hills.
Like hundreds of other cyclists, the two had spent the day watching Stage 3 of the Santos Tour Down Under between Unley and Stirling. With their two wheels on the road, Harvey, Renee and a group of friends started the ride back to the Adelaide CBD.
“I was doing what thousands had been doing that day, just taking a recreational ride around,” Harvey says.
As they descended Eagle on the Hill, another cyclist rode close in front of her—too close. Their wheels connected and Harvey fell, hitting the bitumen below her.
“I came down pretty hard and cut up my [right] elbow, smashed my hip and hit my head,” Harvey says.\
“I was taken by ambulance to the Royal Adelaide Hospital and I was stitched up. I had a huge haematoma (bruise) on my hip and had to put ice on it all night in the hospital—it was pretty painful.”
Harvey had x-rays to make sure her bones were intact—and they showed no bone-breaks or dislocations.
The next morning Harvey was given the all-clear and sent back to the hotel with some painkillers, being told to rest up. But it wasn’t long before she was back at the hospital.
“Half way through the day my elbow was getting sorer and sorer so I went back to the hospital and they gave me more x-rays,” she says.
Harvey was again given the all-clear.
“They gave me some even better pain killers,” she jokes.
Again, she returned to her hotel to rest up and hoped the painkillers would help her get some sleep.
Though she did get some rest, she says she woke about midnight in excruciating pain.
When her partner turned on the light they saw what had been happening, unseen until that moment.
“My arm was really, really swollen—I had blisters all over it and they were bursting in front of us. I couldn’t move my arm at all,” she says.
Renee quickly called the ambulance which rushed her back to the Royal Adelaide Hospital.
“I can’t even remember the ride to hospital—I don’t remember any of the next part,” she says. “I only know what I was told.”
When she arrived at the RAH they realised Harvey picked up a bacteria on the road where she fell—a bacteria called Clostridium Septicum—a flesh eating bacteria also known as necrotising fasciitis.
“There is no way to cure it, and no antibiotics to fix it,” Harvey explains.
The infected skin on her right arm and shoulder needed to be removed during emergency surgery. When there were problems controlling the bleeding from the wounds, more drastic surgery had to be done.
Harvey had her arm and shoulder removed as well as muscles from her back.
“It was unbelievable,” Harvey says.
Her survival was touch and go for the first 48 hours—in fact she was given a 5% chance of survival. Her family and friends flew to Adelaide to be by her side.
Harvey was on life support for a week and had to undergo further surgeries including multiple skin grafts—some of which failed and had to be replaced.
“I woke up a week later in intensive care—I had multiple organ failure—my kidneys had stopped working so I was having dialysis.”
When she woke up Harvey says she had a lot to come to terms with.
“I just couldn’t believe how much time had passed and how many of my family and friends were around—I was like—‘what are you doing here’?\
“I was just out of it for ages.”
She says it was a slow process coming to terms with everything.
“It was a major shock when I realised, one, I was lucky to survive and, two, I haven’t got my arm anymore.”
Harvey spent three months in the Royal Adelaide Hospital recovering from her multiple surgeries (she had 11 in all).
Some days were good and saw her improving; others saw her take some backwards steps.
“It was a long, long, slow recovery,” Harvey says.
Harvey says she was told it was her fitness that helped her survive. As a keen cyclist, triathlete and swimmer she was in great shape.
“I wouldn’t have survived if I wasn’t as fit as I was,” Harvey says.
“People can forget about how it can help in these situations—I can’t emphasise enough how important it is to be fit.”
Like many Melbournians, Harvey grew up riding a bike. When she got her licence at 18, she preferred using her car.
In 2005, she decided she would commute by bike to her work at the YMCA to build her fitness.
“I pulled an old bike out of the garage and just started,” Harvey says.
She was soon riding in events like Bupa Around the Bay—and upgrading her bikes from a flat bar road bike to a more expensive and faster model.
Her riding led to her to compete in triathlons as well.
Kerryn Harvey competing in a triathlon
“I got back into it more seriously back in 2009,” Harvey explains.
She started competing Olympic distance triathlons (1.5km swim, 40 km ride and 10km run), competed in half-Ironmans (1.9km swim, 90km ride and 21km run), and in 2012 she competed in the Melbourne Ironman (a 3.8km swim, 180km ride and 42km run).
When she left hospital in April of 2013, Harvey says she had lost much of the strength and fitness she had built over the years.
But, determined to get back into her life, she started to get back into training.
“I’ve got a wind trainer so I set up my bike on that and spun my legs over and tried to get some sort of fitness back,” Harvey says.
Despite her trepidation, Harvey wanted to get back on the bike—but she knew she wouldn’t be able to ride the bikes she had.
She asked around bike shops and found out ways to modify her bike.
With some help, Harvey had her gears moved to the left-hand side of her bike, and she also has a brake lever on the left-hand side which brakes for both the front and back wheels.
Harvey says she had to relearn to balance on her bike with Renee holding her bike while she got her balance on the street outside their home in Glen Iris.
She would help her to take off and stop.
“It was totally like learning to ride again,” Harvey says.
Starting and stopping have been Harvey’s biggest challenges, as well as overcoming the fear she sometimes has when out on the bike.
“I’m scared out of my mind I’ll fall again—it’s always there,” she says, “but it’s [riding] something I really love and I’m really passionate about.”
“I’m careful where I ride [on my own] now when I’m on my road bike—I don’t ride along Beach Road because it’s too dangerous for me and for other riders,” she says matter-of-factly.
She does, however, venture out that way when on the tandem bike she and partner Renee ride together. The tandem’s name is ‘Wagstaff’, after Harvey’s main surgeon at Royal Adelaide Hospital who played a major role as part of a huge medical team that helped save her life.
“We can go anywhere on that,” she says.
In fact Harvey and her partner tackled Bupa Around the Bay last year (2014) on the tandem bike.
“I’d ridden it two times before (both directions) and I thought, right, I’ve done that—but I [hadn’t] done it on a tandem so it was a new challenge,” she says.
As well as taking on events and studying for a certificate in Personal Training, Harvey has spent the past 12 months setting up the START foundation (www.startfoundation.org.au)—and planning a fundraising bike ride from Perth to Melbourne dubbed ‘Ride for the RAH’ (Royal Adelaide Hospital).
Funds raised from the ride will go towards the Royal Adelaide Hospital’s Intensive Care Research Unit to help buy a special tomographic scanner (for research into patients in intensive care to help improve their recovery) and to help people with a disability achieve their sporting dreams.
Harvey says the grants will be offered to sports people who need modifications to their equipment (much like her new road bike) or to help those who need a carer to go with them to events, or help to pay for a competition entry.
The ride between April 8 and May 12 (2015) will see a group of cyclists, including Harvey, ride between Perth and Melbourne (around 140kms a day).
While it’s a challenge, it’s one Harvey is sure she’s able to not only meet, but beat, all with her two wheels on the road.
To make a donation to Ride for the RAH visit\ http://bit.ly/1qZN1Zs
Photos courtesy of startfoundation.org.au