Full of enthusiasm, Isa de Jongh from Roosendaal leaves at the beginning of February for an internship for Austria. But what should have become an unforgettable experience already changes into a nightmare. During a relaxing afternoon skiing, Isa misses a hill at the bottom of the mountain and flies through the air. She then ends up hard on her back. “I immediately felt it was wrong.”
After the blow, Isa is in the snow. She no longer feels her leg. A trauma helicopter takes her to the hospital in Innsbruck. She stays there for eleven days. She broke her back, neck and chest by the fall. Doctors hold her a terrible scenario, she has a paraplegia and can never run again.
The world of Isa suddenly stopped. Where she was normally found in the gym five days a week – not only to train, but also to record sports videos – she could now lie nothing more than. “I felt trapped in my own body,” she says to Southwest update. The prognosis was uncertain: it was first said that she could never walk again, later the possibility followed that it might be possible, but with aids. There is no clarity.
Button
Isa can no longer move her right leg. She still manages to tighten her thigh. She can still partly move her left leg. “I no longer feel in my feet and gluteal muscle.” Despite everything, the Roosendaalse is positive. “I converted the button and I wanted to prove that I could walk again.” After being in various hospitals, Isa ends up in Rijndam rehabilitation center in Rotterdam. “I wanted to discover what I could do.”
By exercising, she starts to get stronger in her legs. After a few weeks, Isa can even walk a short break with the help of a brace and walker. “The first time that was very tough. Then I thought: if this stays that way, I don’t know if I want it.” She is now used to the idea that she will no longer be able to walk completely independently. “If I now see photos of myself from before the accident, it looks strange, but I have been able to accept it.”
“That I sported so much is probably the reason I am still alive now.”
Where she first stood in the gym five days a week, it is now fully rehabilitation. “Yet I am happy that I have built up so much strength and fitness. That I sported so much is probably the reason that I am still alive.”
De Jongh now has more than eleven thousand followers on her Instagram. “I think that’s super cool.” From her wheelchair she wants to inspire others. According to her, many people think that you cannot exercise in a wheelchair. The opposite wants to prove them. “I can still do some exercises. I would like to show that.”
What the future will bring for the sports fan is uncertain. After three months of rehabilitation in Rotterdam, she can almost go home. A housing unit is placed at her parents’ home. “I will live here until I have found something myself.”
“I hope that at least I can walk with the walker indoors.”
“I hope that at least I can walk with the walker indoors,” says De Jongh. “Klopping would also be a nice challenge. But if I go outside, this will have to be done with a wheelchair.”
