This is an ABC podcast.

Hi, Lynne Malcolm here with an All In The Mind podcast extra for you.

It's related to the recent episode on spinal cord injury research.

We were so taken with Sam Bloom's story about living with paraplegia as a result of her spinal cord

injury that we wanted to share my full conversation with her. I think you'll find her

inspirational. She began by telling me about the accident that led to her injury.

Well, my husband and I have always loved travelling.

And when we had our three boys, we thought, right, you know, as they grow up, we'll hopefully show them the world.

And so we took them to Thailand because we thought, you know, it's pretty close.

It's an easy country and the people are lovely. And so we took them to Thailand because we thought, you know, it's pretty close. It's an easy country and the people are lovely. And so we were, it was like, I think, day four into our holiday

and we were staying at this really nice hotel just opposite the beach.

It was pretty remote.

And one of the kids said, let's go up on this rooftop. So we all went upstairs and I leant on the railing and it broke.

It had dry rot and I didn't realize and it broke and I fell six metres and broke my back.

That was the start of our holiday.

I broke my back at T6, sort of in line with my chest, and I'd also sustain quite a few other injuries.

Like I had subduro, extra-dural hematomas, fractured skull.

One of my lungs collapsed because my chest filled with blood.

Yeah, a few internal injuries.

But obviously, breaking my back was the most severe.

What's your first memory after the accident?

My first memory is actually I was in theatre and I didn't even realise I was in theatre.

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