'My son went off to rugby practise. Then I got the phone call that changed my life forever.'

The following story is an edited extract from the book by Alex Noble titled: I Fight, You Fight, now available for purchase.

IN MUM'S WORDS.

It’s a cliché to say it’s the call no parent ever wants to receive, but there’s no other way to describe it. I still think about it a lot. I remember it so well. It was the day my family’s life changed forever. The night before was a Saturday night, and I had been at my thirty-year high school reunion. I remember that so well, too. School reunions are always so interesting.

Catching up with old friends, and noticing how much everyone had changed without really changing at all. There were air kisses and lots of ‘the boys are doing great!’ conversations frozen in time. But less than twenty-four hours later, those words would have been grossly inaccurate. Thinking back on it now, it was almost like the universe was giving me a chance to acknowledge how good a life I was living in front of all my old peers – an encore of sorts. The next morning, I was standing in the kitchen of our beloved family home in Gladesville. 

We had moved in when I was pregnant with Benji, our third son, and fourteen years’ worth of precious memories with a bustling family full of energetic boys had been created right there in that kitchen. I was standing by our breakfast bench, my hands busied by dishes and wiping when the phone rang.

Watch: Vanessa Cranfield on parenting a child with a disability. Post continues after video.

It was Hamish’s mum, Jillian. She was at the rugby sevens training – where Glen had dropped Alex about an hour ago. "Kylie, there’s been an accident," she said. "Who?" was all I replied. "It’s Alex." I froze. The phone in my hand. The words would not come. Jillian’s words, however, have replayed over in my head a thousand times since that day. She told me she could see Alex lying on the pitch; they’d called an ambulance and suggested calmly that I should make my way over there. Details were scarce, but I knew I had to move. I gathered up my handbag and house keys and got into the car. Quick and purposeful.

It wasn’t my first rodeo. Being a mum to boys who loved their sport, the hospital wasn’t a foreign place to us – we’d only recently brought Zac home after his second knee reconstruction surgery. While I wasn’t panicking – yet – I did have a sense of urgency. I’ve watched a lot of football, and I’ve seen a lot of head knocks. I know that when someone goes down after a tackle you always wait for them to get up. "It’s okay, they’re getting back up" – the crowd collectively breathes a sigh of relief. Jillian hadn’t said Alex got up. I called Glen and told him Alex had been injured and I was on my way to Knox Oval in the northern suburbs. He said he’d meet me there. It was about a twenty-five-minute drive from our place and I kicked into autopilot as I weaved in and out of Sydney’s Sunday traffic.

Jillian called again. "Hello? The ambulance had arrived, and they were taking Alex to Westmead Children’s Hospital, in the western suburbs, a long way from Knox." I pulled the car over to regroup; change direction. Think, Kylie, think. A few beats later and I was aggressively pulling the car away from the curb, on the move again towards Westmead – a Mum on a mission. My phone rang. It was Alex’s friend Bill, who was riding in the ambulance, "Kylie, we’re not going to Westmead Children’s, we’re going to North Shore. See you there."

I pulled the car over, again, and found myself hunched over the steering wheel. The control I had maintained up to this point was fading. I felt a swelling in my chest, which boiled over until I let out a sound, unlike anything I’ve heard come out of my mouth before. It was a guttural "No!" It was the first of many such deep, animalistic sounds that would leave my body over the course of the next four years. 

Where the hell am I going? I just need to see my son.

Arriving at the Emergency Department at Royal North Shore Hospital, the first person I saw was Bill’s dad, Rowan. I looked at him, and his face took me by surprise. There was a six-foot-to-heaven mountain of a man, always the life of the party, looking at me with a face full of torture. His eyes were swollen and his face red and crumpled. 

Serious bawling had been taking place. He obviously knew more than I did. The next person I saw was Dally, Alex’s kindred spirit in many ways; they were born a day apart, and both driven by their passion for football. As I write this, five years down the track, the bitter irony resonates as Dally is in Vancouver representing his country playing rugby 7s, the very game that was to cruelly snatch away Alex’s dreams of playing football again. 

Back to the scene. Dally was crying too. What’s going on? I thought. These strong, formidable jocks had been brought to their knees. Reality started to sink in. When Glen arrived, the hospital staff ushered us all into a private waiting room. The 7s coach and manager, who were both deeply concerned, were told to wait in there too. Still no Alex. At this point, I felt suspended, like I was holding my breath and standing somewhere out of my body. I hadn’t come unstuck, not yet, but I knew this was serious. 

The first piece of information came from a doctor who joined us in the waiting room and told us Alex’s scans were showing evidence of a spinal cord injury.

They were still waiting on some secondary results to confirm, so we had to wait a little longer too. I could tell he was choosing his words carefully.

Wait. It was all we could do. Wait. I have no recollection of the following few hours. I know they were painful and mind-numbing. The thoughts crashing through my mind like waves; the what ifs; the maybes. What seemed like an eternity must have passed before we heard from the doctor that Alex was going into surgery. 

Surgery that could take about nine or ten hours. The doctor said we could see him before he went under. We walked up to where Alex was being kept, lying on one of the hospital trolley beds, covered in blankets in the corridor of the operating theatres, head cap on and prepped to go straight into surgery. 

His face was still Alex. He gave me a groggy smile but didn’t say much. I went straight to him. My boy. My beautiful boy. I kissed his sweet face and caressed his cheek for only a moment; I didn’t want to leave him. "Be brave, my precious son," I uttered under my breath as they rolled him away. At this stage I started to feel even more suspended and out of body; it was surreal. 

We went back to our private room to resume the endless waiting. I got in touch with Dally’s mum, Kristen. Dally was her youngest of four and I had come to admire her as a woman and a mother. She came to the hospital straight away and supported Glen and me during those harrowing hours. She suggested we go out for a walk to help pass the time. I begrudgingly agreed. The three of us stepped outside the ED. The sun was shining, the air felt fresh and clean.

It probably was a good idea to get some fresh air. Or so I thought. As we strolled aimlessly, we crossed the road and found ourselves in front of Gore Hill Oval. A football field with Sunday’s matches still in play; mothers and fathers watching their sons enjoying their active lives. This was the sight that finally broke me. My body went limp, the feeling of suspension heightened, a wave of nausea, dizziness – all the strength in my limbs left me, my body gave way and I collapsed onto the pavement. 

Glen and Kristen caught me, but they let me slide and put me into a comfortable position. The wind had been taken right out of my sails. I felt outside of my body. I didn’t have the will or the energy to get up. Small graces; collapsing outside a hospital meant I was given immediate attention. 

An ambulance came out of nowhere and I recall a warm smile and a competent hand assisting me onto a stretcher and into the ambulance which brought us a whole fifty metres back to the emergency waiting room. Over the coming weeks and months ahead, I would become familiar with the different ways that grief would involuntarily pour out of my body, leaving me in the foetal position.

If my son was losing control of his body, maybe in some sick way I was too. The next six hours or so were a blur of nausea, angst and trepidation. It was about 10 pm when they told us Alex was out of surgery and they would take us up to meet the surgeon.

I was still uneasy on my feet and unable to walk properly so I had to be helped into the surgeon’s office and then into the chair at his desk for the post-surgery results. I shuffled down in the chair so my neck could be supported by the back of it; my head lolled to one side and my eyes glazed over. Glen sat a little straighter next to me. 

Some long-gone, logical-thinking version of myself pulled out my phone to record the impending conversation in case we ever needed to refer back to it. I still have the video. I have not once been able to bring myself to listen to it again. 

"Something something something – severe spinal cord injury, Alex is unlikely to ever walk again – something something..." "Ever walk again" were the only words I heard or understood. Nothing else mattered. That’s it. Never again.

Alex won’t walk. Never. Alex won’t be able to walk ever again. 

That’s it. 

Never. 

Catastrophic injury. 

Quadriplegic. 

Wheelchair. 

The words spun around and around in my head. As an English teacher, I knew what catastrophic meant – but I’d only ever used it in the melodramatic context of "That’s a catastrophe!" In the context of this conversation, it was a literal scientific term to describe what had happened to my son.

Adjective: catastrophic. 

Involving or causing sudden great damage or suffering. 

I found myself hating the surgeon. I hate him. Of all my boys – actually of every kid I knew – this couldn’t be happening to a worse one, I remember thinking. Alex was our middle child, but you wouldn’t know it by how he carried himself. He was the whole package. He came into the world at 4.4 kg (a big baby) and was walking by ten months old. Even from the way my hair and nails shone when I was carrying him, I knew he was going to be impressive. People flocked towards Alex. They were drawn to him. I’d watch him on the school playground, where he would literally have a small army of other children following him around and taking his lead. Before he got to school, I’d had to put him into pre-school early to satisfy his need for human interaction and attention. When he was old enough to understand, I remember pulling him aside and reminding him what a privilege it was to be so well-liked and so good at sport... and to always remain humble. 

All three of my boys were obsessed with sport; they bounced off the walls at home, where Glen and I were always running around after them. It was exhausting work. Every weekend we were tag-teaming to get them to their various sporting commitments – soccer, then touch football, cricket, swimming, tennis, you name it.

My eldest, Zac, and Alex were always competing with each other over one thing or another. They fought a little as a result of being so close in age, and Alex was always able to give Zac a good run for his money. Alex was skilled physically. And he had the discipline to match. 

We were well aware of his potential to do well in his chosen sport. Of course, it was rugby. Once we finally let him play, that was it. Alex lived and breathed it. He would not miss a beat; would not miss a session. In the weeks leading up to this fateful day, Alex even skipped a family trip to Cairns to play rugby. Any chance to play, to progress up the ladder – he really did dream of making it to the top. He used to absolutely ride Glen and me about being on time to drop him at training; we’d be roused out the door, always arriving early. 

It was dawning on me that this was never going to happen again. Then one of the most intrusively jarring thoughts you can have as a mother popped into my head – if I know this kid, he’s not going to want to continue his life like this. And that was okay, if he didn’t want to, then I wouldn’t either, I bargained.

That’s probably a hard bargain for you – the reader – to comprehend. But that was precisely how I felt. Put it down to maternal instinct. Put it down to motherly love. Glen didn’t recognise the shell of a person that I’d become by the time we walked out of the surgeon’s office. But as the stronger one of us, he implored me to stay strong too. He said, "Whatever you do, Kylie, you have to stay strong in front of him. You have to." I promised him I would. 

Alex hadn’t woken up from the surgery, and we figured we should probably get some rest too, not knowing what the next few days could bring. The hospital gave us a room with two couches, which Glen and I pushed together to make a quasi-double bed. For the next two weeks, we slept in that room, scared to death and clinging to each other, night in and night out. 

Word had got out among our extended family and friends about what had happened, and offers of help started flooding in. Our youngest son, Benji, was taken in by a school friend. I didn’t even know the mum, Maree, from a bar of soap, but she said Benji could stay as long as we needed him to. My own mum was around too, helping Zac, who was in the middle of his exams for the HSC, the senior high school certificate in New South Wales. Luckily, he could drive, so he was able to get around between school and home and his other commitments. 

Glen and I found ourselves studying, too. Quadriplegia. It was one thing to find out your son had suffered a catastrophic spinal cord injury, but to learn everything that goes with it felt like blow after blow after blow. Things like bowel care, enemas, catheters, pressure sores and temperature control. 

Then there were the thoughts a mother couldn’t help but have: How is he going to have a normal life? Is he going to fall in love and have children? Will he ever get a job and travel and do all the things normal young people do? I know that these were, in some respects, selfish thoughts, but I couldn’t help but think them. I also couldn’t let my mind go there if I was going to stay strong like I had promised Glen. 

Spinal cord injuries are so case-by-case – unique to each patient. The small piece of hope we clung to in the days ahead came from our clinical nurse specialist, Matt, who was a godsend and an expert in quadriplegia. He spoke to us with facts and statistics that we could understand and gave us positive, real-life examples. Matt told us about the efforts the doctors were making; how they were pumping Alex’s neck full of fluid and medication in an attempt to regenerate his spinal matter. 

He told us that you just can’t predict what type of movement any patient is going to get back. 

He told us it could be up to a year until we understand the full extent of the injury. So there, in the darkest days of my life, there was still a little bit of hope. And we only needed a little. When tragedy of this enormity strikes a family, you never know what is going to happen. 

But at the time of writing this, it has almost been five years since his accident and as I started to contemplate the idea that maybe Alex’s life could end up greater than it was before, he came past me one night and said: "Mum, we’re all good. You’re all good. You have everything you need. 

"We have the best family in the world. Look at us."

And perhaps he is right. 

Here we all are. All living The Noble Way.

I Fight, You Fight by Alex Noble. Image: Simon & Schuster.

I Fight, You Fight by Alex Noble is now available for purchase, here.

Feature image: Supplied.