A gym-going high flyer who woke up paralysed at only 31 refuses to let her disability hold her back, representing Great Britain as a wheelchair tennis star. Working as a marketing executive, Tabitha Fung, 39, woke up one morning back in 2014 unable to move or feel her legs.
She said: “It was so frightening, suddenly not being able to move, being trapped on the bed. I ended up calling an ambulance and was taken to hospital, where they did all sorts of tests. At first, they thought it might be a condition called cauda equina syndrome, which is where all the nerves in the lower back suddenly become severely compressed, but they ruled it out.”
Forced to move back in with her parents while she came to terms with her disability, the contrast with her old life – in which she travelled up and down the country for work and went to the gym twice a week – was dramatic. But since discovering tennis in spring 2015, Tabitha, who is now a clinical data officer for the NHS, says her lust for life has been restored.
