Janine Shepherd - Defiant: A Broken Body Is Not a Broken Person

Dedicated to my three beautiful children:

Annabel, Charlotte, and Angus.

And to David, my love.

And to all who heed the call of the defiant human spirit.

CONTENTS

PROLOGUE

I was once given the most extraordinary gift. I lived in death for ten days. This was not the near-death experience so many people have described. There was no light at the end of the tunnel, no voices saying it was not yet my time. There were no religious images, no welcoming angels.

But I could move between dimensions at will. One moment, I was part of my body and in the physical plane; the next, I was in a distinctly spiritual one. Sometimes I was in both at once. The striking difference between them was that when I was in the physical dimension, I was aware of excruciating pain; while in the spiritual, I was detached from earthly concerns and painfree.

I was guided and nurtured by those who had traveled such a journey long before mine. There were no words spoken. Only thoughts. And those thoughts are difficult to recount. I experienced pure awareness. I was offered a choice: remain in this spiritual world or return to my physical bodya body seemingly broken beyond its ability to serve me. If I returned, Id face unimaginable pain, incalculable physical and emotional loss, and my life would never be the same. This decision was mine alone to make.

I have always wondered why this life-in-death was unique to me. For years after my accident, I devoured books and stories of near-death experiences, or NDEs as we casually refer to them. I have yet to find anything that resembled my experience.

My family and the medical team in intensive care held anxious vigil as I clung to life. My internal bleeding was so profuse the doctors did not expect me to survive.

When I returned to my broken bodyafter ten days of confounding all attempts to stanch itthe internal bleeding had stopped.

I did not come back to my body to share my understanding of the afterlife: I returned to learn how to live fully. Once Id made the choice to return, it proved far more useful to embrace my life in the present than to dream of ways to escape it.

And the gift? Those ten days in death, alternating between physical and ethereal planes, gave me a profound understanding of who I am. My purpose in life was revealed.

The gift of my death experience is a part of every cell of my being, every moment of every day. This is not something I believe; this is something I know.

Theres one more thing I know: I am not my body, and you, dear reader, are not yours.

A broken body is not a broken person.

Janine Shepherd

Alta, Wyoming

March 2016

PART ONE

LIFE OR DEATH

Show me a way through this, or show me a way out.

1

MAY 31, 1986

Castle Hill, near Sydney, Australia

When will you be home? Mum asked, as I rushed out the door and grabbed my bicycle.

About ten tonight, I yelled back to her. My cycling partner, Chris, and I were already late, and everyone would be waiting for us.

I was dressed in riding shorts and a yellow jersey. I made a point of wearing brightly colored clothes when I biked on roads, as Id already had a few scrapes with traffic. Riding home from the pool one day, I was passed by a truck whose driver didnt see me. I was forced into a ditch and suffered some nasty cuts and bruises. On another occasion, I was edged off the road and ended up with bruised ribs. Near misses such as these made me wary on busy thoroughfares and keen to be visible to drivers.

I pulled my helmet on, took a sip from my water bottle, and jumped on my bike. Chris pedaled close behind, working hard to keep up with my eager pace.

I always pushed myself to the limit, both physically and mentally. A natural athlete, I had represented my league and school teams at both state and national levels in a variety of sports, including softball and triathlons. Now, as the top performer in the Australian National Cross-Country Ski Team, I had found my sport. It was as if Id been born for it. Training and competing in ski racing obsessed me in a way nothing else had. Cross-country skiing was my passion, and training events like that days bike ride would help me start the upcoming season in top physical shape.

I waved goodbye to Mum and set off for the six-hour ride ahead. I was unusually tired that day; perhaps Id been pushing myself too hard. The demanding training schedule and constant physical exertion were taking a toll. Only days before I had visited the doctor for tests to determine why I had skipped a few of my periods. I was diagnosed with exercise amenorrhea, or lack of menstruation, common in female endurance athletes who overtrain. It was a confirmation that my body was under too much stress. Id thought twice about even going on the ride with Chris and my friends, but the details and schedule had all been arranged, so I pushed aside my doubts and settled into my cycling rhythm.

There were about twenty of us on the ride, and as usual I was the only female. We called it the Rooster Ride because our destination was the Red Rooster Restaurant at the top of a mountainthe culmination of a grueling climb.

It was late morning before the group finally assembled and got rolling. The sun was beating down on us, so I took off my training jacket and packed it in my bag. When we reached the base of the mountains, we spread out, a natural response to the various levels of ability, desired intensity, and conditioning among the group of elite riders. Ever competitive, I rode near the front of the pack.

After an hour of pedaling flat terrain, we approached the foothills of the Blue Mountains. This was the part of the Rooster Ride I relished. I loved the hills. My training ethic and fierce competitiveness had earned me the nickname Janine the Machine. Because I was focused, determined, and driven, I was on track to represent Australia in cross-country skiing at the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary. The Olympics are the ultimate dream for any athlete, and nothing was going to stand in my way. Nothing. Committed to making each training day count until then, I dug deep and pushed fatigue aside to tackle the challenging grades of this ride.

Once we were in the hills, the mood of the riders grew serious. As we climbed farther into the mountains, the temperature dropped, and the crisp mountain air burned my lungs with every deep breath. We put our heads down and concentrated on the grind of making it to the top. The incline made me redouble my efforts. As I reeled in and passed other riders, I could hear their labored breathing and see the strain in their faces. They were suffering. I pushed harder, spurred on to overtake each rider, one by one.

Approaching one of the final hills, I saw a lone cyclist ahead of meJohn. I pushed to catch him and saw that he was flagging.

Hey, mate! How you doing? I asked, as I drew alongside, feigning a casual manner that belied the burning sensation in my legs. I didnt want him to see that I, too, was nearly spent.