Dinesh Palipana · 35 min
After a car accident left him paralysed halfway through medical school, Dinesh Palipana refused to stop, and became Australia's first quadriplegic medical intern, proving that the mind and spirit can outlast almost any physical limitation.
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Dinesh Palipana grew up in Sri Lanka during three decades of civil war, where he saw violence and poverty that taught him early what it meant to have nothing. When his family moved to Australia in 1994, he built a life that looked successful on paper: law school, university, a path forward. But inside, he was hollow. Depression hit him hard in law school, pulling him into anxiety and panic so severe that being trapped in his own mind felt worse than any physical prison. Then he saw a GP who changed everything. That doctor's simple act of help became his why: to do for others what had been done for him. He switched to medicine, found his purpose, and for the first time, life felt right.
On 31 January 2010, halfway through medical school, his car aquaplaned on a wet road. He woke in intensive care unable to move or feel anything below his chest. Eight months in hospital followed: machines keeping him alive, his family falling apart, no money, days when he and his mother did not know where they would sleep. But he had hope. His mother told him it would be okay, and he believed her. His girlfriend made risotto on his hospital bed. Friends pinned poems to his wall. He came back to medical school with two years left, waking at 3 or 4 AM most days to manage his physical needs, attend classes, and study until the last tram home. He finished. He became a doctor.
Thirteen years later, Dinesh works in emergency medicine at Gold Coast University Hospital. He has written a book called Stronger. He has flown planes, modeled at Australian Fashion Week, and built a life he never thought possible. What he has learned is that depression and his spinal cord injury did not break him. They made him. All the things he has become, he became after the accident. He would not take any of it back.
“Being a prisoner of my mind was far worse than being a prisoner of my body because all these things I've been able to do, graduate from medical school, everything has been after the spinal cord injury.”
“What I can promise you is that you have more inside you, more potential, more strength, more power, and more resilience than you'll ever know. And even though sometimes you may not be able to see the light, even though sometimes you may not be able to see the tomorrow, just take one step at a time, and just keep going. And I promise you, you'll make it.”
“Purpose is that thing that makes us get up out of bed in the morning. Purpose is that thing that gives us energy. Purpose is that thing that gives us a resilience to get through the hard times.”
The hero, today
Dinesh learned to compare depression to his spinal cord injury and realized that being a prisoner of his mind was far worse than being a prisoner of his body, because all his achievements came after the accident. When Dinesh saw his GP during depression in law school, he found his purpose: to do for others what that doctor did for him, which became the 'why' that kept him alive in hospital and got him through medical school. Hope was the single most important thing that kept Dinesh going during his eight months in hospital, and his mother's belief that 'it's gonna be okay' gave him something to hold onto in the dark nights. Dinesh returned to medical school two years before graduating and woke at 3 or 4 AM most days to manage his physical needs, attend classes, and study, refusing to give up on the work he loved. Dinesh does not regret the depression or the spinal cord injury, because both shaped who he is today and none of his achievements would have happened without them.
Yes. Dinesh Palipana is a real person who shared their own story in their own words. Kintsugi Heroes is a not-for-profit that shares first-person stories of overcoming adversity, told with the person's consent.
Kintsugi Heroes, a registered Australian not-for-profit. Every story is shared with the hero's own consent and reviewed under Kintsugi Heroes' trauma-informed content standard before it goes public.
Dinesh learned to compare depression to his spinal cord injury and realized that being a prisoner of his mind was far worse than being a prisoner of his body, because all his achievements came after the accident.
When Dinesh saw his GP during depression in law school, he found his purpose: to do for others what that doctor did for him, which became the 'why' that kept him alive in hospital and got him through medical school.
Hope was the single most important thing that kept Dinesh going during his eight months in hospital, and his mother's belief that 'it's gonna be okay' gave him something to hold onto in the dark nights.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 00:00
Kintsugi Heroes acknowledges funding and was made possible with support from the Community Broadcasting Foundation.
Dinesh Palipana (Guest) · 00:05
Find out more at cbf.org.au. Welcome to the Kintsugi Heroes podcast, where we share inspirational stories of everyday people going through different challenges and how they overcome them. Please be aware that the story you're about to hear may have moments of deeply felt emotions and personal experiences. If anything you hear has a triggering effect, please reach out to someone who can help keep you safe. If you love this conversation, we'd love you to like and share it with your friends so we can continue to share more inspiration and hope to as many people as possible. Now listen up for our next hero story. This story is with Dinesh Palipana, and it was one that took quite a while to happen because we originally organized it more than 6 months before the conversation took place. And I'm so grateful that we got there in the end. It was worth the wait for both of us. We had such a great conversation. If you're looking at the website or the page and you're looking at the show notes about Dinesh, you'll notice this long list of accolades and awards, and he's He's just such a remarkable man, and all of this has come about since his accident. And his story is about physical injury where he was in a motor vehicle accident, and at the time he was halfway through his medical studies at university to become a doctor. He ended up finishing his studies eventually, but he had a cervical spinal cord injury, meaning that things were a lot more difficult. You could say that could have been too hard, but for some reason in his mind it wasn't too hard and he had to finish. And as a result, he is a practicing doctor. He works in the emergency department at the Gold Coast University Hospital in Australia. He is a beacon of light and he's written his own book as well called Stronger. It's a story of hope. I know you're going to love this one with Dinesh Palipana. Hello, here we are. It is another episode of Kintsugi Heroes, and I'm here today with my guest Dinesh. How are you, Dinesh?
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Dinesh returned to medical school two years before graduating and woke at 3 or 4 AM most days to manage his physical needs, attend classes, and study, refusing to give up on the work he loved.
This conversation includes growing up in a war, finding purpose in law school, losing it to depression, a doctor changed my life, medical school and a wet road, waking up paralyzed and eight months in intensive care.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 02:35
Hey, I'm good. It's been a long time in the making.
Dinesh Palipana (Guest) · 02:38
It really has. Well, this is Kintsugi Heroes. I just want to first of all thank you for being here. Thank you for making the time to meet with me to share your story and, you know, be vulnerable and be open and brave, because sometimes these stories are not easy to share. And yet it's important that we do share our stories and connect with people through our stories. So I just want to thank you for that.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 03:02
No, thank you for having me. And, you know, I didn't really know what, um, Kintsugi was until we connected, and I just love the concept. I just love the idea of it. I love, I love everything about it.
Dinesh Palipana (Guest) · 03:14
You are very welcome. I'm excited too. This is about you, so now I'm gonna hand over to you and ask you to take us back to the beginning and share with us your story.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 03:24
I have a lot to be grateful for. I have a lot to be thankful for every single day. I think about, uh, the simple things that I get to do every day, like eat and have clothes and be warm and to have electricity, uh, because my life started in a place where many people didn't have these things and many people still don't. I was born in Sri Lanka in 1984, and when I was growing up in Sri Lanka, the country had a war that lasted over 3 decades between the Sinhalese and Tamil people. And when I was a kid, I saw a lot of violence. I saw a lot of people dying. I saw a lot of people been blown up. I saw a lot of people, uh, in poverty. And even driving around, right, uh, we, we drove from home to where I'm speaking to you from today. And even when I'm driving around on the roads, I, I appreciate the roads and I appreciate all those things. But I remember when we were, uh, when I was growing up, the army used to pull us over multiple times on the road somewhere because they'd need to search the car or they'd need to find separatists or they need to check your IDs and all that stuff. So even your freedom of movement was restricted in so many ways. So there's so much that I'm grateful for after growing up in that environment. And here we are today in Australia, but we were lucky because my dad is an engineer and Australia needed engineers. So in 1994, we moved to Australia and we started life all over again in Sydney. And Sydney was, you know, every time I go to Sydney now, I have a huge sense of nostalgia. And I love Sydney because it just reminds me of those days when I first came to Australia and started to see this new country and to learn about all these new things and see a supermarket for the first time and to see a highway for the first time and to eat a lamington for the first time. All good things. So, every time I go to Sydney, I just have that sense of, yeah, even those smells. I just remember those smells. But we lived in Sydney for a bit and then we moved to Byron Bay, which was such a picturesque place to grow up in. Byron Bay was so beautiful and Byron Bay was very quiet back then. So, I spent a large part of my teenage years there. And we moved to Brisbane where I finished school. And there's something really important that happened, which was for me to understand purpose. And I think for all of us today, that why, that reason, that purpose is really important because purpose is that thing that makes us get up out of bed in the morning, right? Purpose is that thing that gives us energy. Purpose is that thing that gives us a resilience to get through the hard times. And as it was said, he who has a why to live can bear almost any how. So finding that why is a really important thing, I think. But at that point in my life, I didn't really have a why, and I didn't really know what that was. And well, I finished school and I was trying to figure out what to do, and I ended up deciding to do law, and I didn't really have a good reason for doing it. I just thought I should go to uni and study something. So I ended up studying law, but when I was in law school, I experienced depression. And again, I think depression, you know, there are so many facets to depression. There's a biological aspect. There are so many different things. But I think one of the other important things to think about when we're going through something like depression is to nut out some of the other root causes of it. And for me, it was because I was living a life, I think it was very superficial. I think I was really materialistic. I wasn't the person I am today. And I think I needed to learn a lot about what it is to be a human being, and I just needed to change myself. So I got depressed, and depression was one of the hardest things I've ever had to deal with. I went to a really dark place, and I developed anxiety disorder and a panic disorder. And I often say that I have a spinal cord injury now. And when I woke up in the hospital 13 years ago with the spinal cord injury, I felt like a prisoner in my body because even if I wanted to, I couldn't get up and run away. I couldn't escape that situation. And it was a massive struggle. I felt like a prisoner in my body, which was the worst thing. But 13 years later today, I have the opportunity to compare having depression to a spinal cord injury. What I realized for me is that being a prisoner of my mind was far worse than being a prisoner of my body because all these things I've been able to do, graduate from medical school, everything has been after the spinal cord injury. So I think, uh, as long as we have our mind and spirit, We can do so much. So anyway, I think that's the first time I was broken, when I had depression, but I was remade. I started to see a doctor and that's how I found my purpose, that why, because I realized, man, this doctor, he did something amazing. He changed my life. He helped me come out of the depression. I remember when I came out of the depression, I remember the very day I drove out of the garage and I realized that I could feel the sun on my skin again and I could see the blue color of the sky and the green color of the trees and it was springtime so I could smell the air again and oh, it was just so beautiful and I remember it so viscerally and I felt alive again. So as my mom likes to say, by helping one person, you may not change the world, but you'll change the world for them. And that became my purpose because that philosophy struck such a deep chord in my heart. So I decided to finish law school and then study medicine. And I got into medical school in 2008. Life was amazing. I felt at peace. I felt purposeful. I felt happy. I just felt, it just felt right. But I don't think often life is not straightforward. And I was involved in a car accident. In 2010. So on the 31st of January, 2010, my car aquaplaned on a wet road. It had a rollover, and I had a spinal cord injury. So when the car stopped rolling, I tried to get out, and I realized that I was paralyzed. I couldn't move my fingers, I couldn't move anything below the chest, and I couldn't feel anything. And I knew the worst thing had happened to me. And then I tried to get out of the car and I couldn't. And I was, uh, ambulance came and fire truck came and I was cut out of the car, was taken to the hospital, went into the operating theater that night and woke up in the intensive care unit. A few days later I had a tube, a drain coming out of my neck. I had a drain coming out the back of the neck. I had a feeding tube. I was on a ventilator. Machines were keeping me alive for the first few days and then I had to work on breathing on my own and I had to work on sitting upright. I had to work on all these things and it was so painstaking physically. I spent 8 months in the hospital doing all that. But, you know, in addition to all the physical things, it was all the other stuff. Like my mom and dad split up, friends walked away, we had to sell the house. And then at the end of those 8 months in the hospital, when we left, it was just me and mom. And for the next 4 years, life was pretty tough. We had no money. There were days when mom and I didn't know where we were going to live the next day. There were days when I didn't eat. There were days when I shivered in the cold until someone came back home to put a blanket on me. And one of my friends, she printed out the poem Invictus and hung it to my bedside in the hospital. And Invictus is an amazing poem. It was, uh, the word means invincible or undefeated. And it goes through the story of a man who goes through an incredibly tough time. But at the end of the poem, it says, no matter how bloody my head becomes from these blows, I will not bow down. And I am the master of my fate and the captain of my soul. So I didn't want to bow down, and I wanted to be the master of my fate and the captain of my soul. So I came back to medical school. There was a lot of pessimism, and there's a lot of, uh, I don't think this can be done. I don't think you could pass medical school. I don't think you'll be able to do what you need to do physically. But, um, I came back, I passed, and I busted my butt. I used to wake up at 3 AM a lot of days and then go to sleep at 11. But I graduated from medical school, and it's now my 7th year as a doctor, and life is good. I've done so much in, in this life that I never thought I'd be able to do. And, uh, you know, I was a model at Australian Fashion Week. I've written a book, which is at the bookshelf. Someone sent me a photo actually just before this podcast. They were at a bookstore and they said, look at this, I saw your book here. And I flew a plane again last year. It's just been a good life. And I think I've learned to look at hardship a different way. I've learned to embrace the difficulties that come to our lives. And I think it's appropriate that Kintsugi is a Japanese concept because one of my favorite haikus is one that a Japanese samurai wrote, and he essentially says that my barn having burnt down, I can see the moon, and now I can see the moon myself. Sorry for the interruption. This is Ian Westmoreland, the founder of Kintsugi Heroes, and thank you for listening to this story from one of our amazing heroes. Our mission is for these stories to provide hope and inspiration to people experiencing life challenges and to also educate the broader community on how best to provide support. If you would like to help us to continue to produce more hero stories and cover more adversity themes, we would welcome all donations. These can be made via our website, kitsukiheroes.com.au.
Dinesh Palipana (Guest) · 14:05
Au.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 14:06
The donate function is at the bottom of the homepage. We'd also welcome any feedback. You can email me direct using ian@kintsugiheroes.com.au. Now let's get back to the story.
Dinesh Palipana (Guest) · 14:27
Wow, there's a lot there, Dinesh. I was thinking about your reflection on the depression And I know in life it's not, it's not good to say, what if this never happened, or what if this happens? But if you didn't have the depression when you were in law school, would you have a different perspective on your physical injury?
Aveline Clark (Host) · 14:48
No, I think that is an important question to ask often because I think it gives us a sense of perspective. And, um, I was with two people who also have different kinds of disabilities and we asked each other these questions and one person said, no, I'd never take it back because it's made me who I am today. And then another person said, you know, maybe I would take it back. But so I think it's a good question to ask ourselves because it gives us a perspective about where life is and where life has come and maybe about, you know, about various things. But for me, I think it has made me a better person. It's given me, it's reminded me a lot of perspective. And if I didn't go through depression in law school, I wouldn't be a doctor today and I wouldn't be in this journey. In fact, I probably wouldn't have had the spinal cord injury. I wouldn't have, so many things would not have happened. When I first had the spinal cord injury, I would have done anything to take it back. I would have done anything to have my old life back. Anything. But today, 13 years later, You know, I've got so many people in my life. I've been able to do so many things and to not do that, I think it's too steep a price to pay. So I wouldn't take it back. So going back to the depression again, like if that didn't happen, none of these things would have happened. But I don't think I'd change that. I don't think I'd change life in any way. Life is precious. Life is good. I'm still more fortunate than billions of people, you know, just by virtue of living in Australia, right? We're a country of 25 million people, 25 million of the most prosperous, fortunate people that get to live in a country like this out of the 7 billion people on this planet. That's pretty good already.
Dinesh Palipana (Guest) · 16:36
I love that you've got so much natural gratitude, and you started off sharing with gratitude for who you are and your life, and you said, you know, having warm clothes and electricity. When in your life did the sense of gratitude take hold? Was it after you came to Australia as a boy?
Aveline Clark (Host) · 16:56
No, not really. I think it was much later. I think it was actually after the Depression that caused it. I think it was more after the spinal cord injury that it became solidified. Because I do think those foundations were laid early. Because the kids I grew up with in Sri Lanka were so poor. They didn't have houses. They didn't have— when they did have houses, they were huts made out of mud and clay. They didn't have roofs, they didn't have electricity, they didn't have water, they didn't have shoes or food or anything like that. So just remembering my friends that I went to school with, it reminds me to be grateful for the things that I do have. But I don't think I really realized that until partly after the depression, but mostly after the spinal cord injury happened. And really it's been most solidified in me probably over the last 5 or 6 years.
Dinesh Palipana (Guest) · 17:53
It's beautiful. Well done for going and seeing a doctor when you were depressed. Did you have someone like close friends or a close circle or a family member that encouraged you to do that, also supported you when you were going through that phase?
Aveline Clark (Host) · 18:09
Those days we weren't having the same discussions about depression. And those days I don't think we had the same understanding about depression that we do today. So the discourse was very different. And in fact, I don't think we really understood depression for what it is like we do now. So I was kind of stumbling around in the dark and I think my friends and family were stumbling around in the dark. So, and I don't really even know if anyone knew what was happening to me at the time. It was just through like a, I suppose a shotgun approach almost of trying everything I could to feel better. And eventually, um, thinking, okay, maybe I'll just try a GP. And then I went to my doctor and that, that's how it happened. But I think seeking help when you're feeling like that is so important. And just yesterday I read an article that was talking about, uh, 16 of my medical colleagues of late losing their lives to depression. And it went through the story of 2 of them, 2 of them were, uh, were parents with 3 children. And I mean, yeah, it's, it's, it happens to even the doctors. So, um, I think it's critically important to seek help.
Dinesh Palipana (Guest) · 19:26
Absolutely. Tell me about your time. You are in hospital for 8 months. You obviously had had that important and forming experience with having depression. So like you said, you had that mental pain that you got through, but then you got into you found yourself with this physical entrapment. What helped get you through those 8 months and beyond? Was it a person, an inner belief, was it a mixture?
Aveline Clark (Host) · 19:54
That's a great question. I think it was a mixture of things because it was just up and down, up and down, up and down. The first few days, first few weeks were horrific because not only are you trying to come to terms with what has happened, just trying to go through the physical rigors of recovery and learning how to live and survive. And so I think it was, um, it was a combination of things, but if I had to pick one thing, it'd be hope. Hope is so important. And it's one of the things that we are sadly quickest to take away from people, whether it be in the medical profession or whether it be wherever else. Like hope is so important, whether it be hope that life will be better, hope that everything would be okay, just hope. So I think hope is what kept me going, like in those dark nights. And my mom was very good at, you know, she's like, it's gonna be okay, and you just believe it, right? When your mom says it, you just believe it. So hope was probably one of the things. Mum was one of the other things, you know, she was there every day, she was there on little things like I did for people, like pinning up Invictus by my bedside. That was, that was pretty cool. I had a girlfriend at the time and she was a medical student, so I don't know how she was passing medical school while being there for me at the same time. She used to come nearly every day. She did come every day, actually. So she used to come and see me every day. She used to go to medical school and moonlight as a nurse. So she was doing all that. But I remember one day she bought some candles and a bunch of stuff, and she made risotto, and we had a little date on the hospital bed. And those kind of things were really, really cool, and it just helped. And just the other day, again, I've heard this a number of times, but just the other day again, someone was telling me that risotto is really a labor of love because you have to be there and stir, and it takes time. And for someone to do that, that's love.
Dinesh Palipana (Guest) · 21:58
I like that. I love risotto too, and having made it, I'm nodding along going, yes, I know, and it is a labor of love. And when it— when you get it right, it's just so worth it. And what a lovely memory that you have of that act of love and generosity. How did you go then, going back to uni? Because obviously medical— a medical degree is what, 6 years? How many years did you have to go to finish after the accident?
Aveline Clark (Host) · 22:23
So yeah, I was, uh, I was in the post-grad med, which is 4, and there was 2 years left. By that point, I'd set myself up physically so I could get myself around in the wheelchair. I learned how to hold a stethoscope even though my fingers aren't working. I learned how to do simple procedures and things if needed. And so I learned how to do a lot of stuff physically, but it was still hard. Because there was, um, in the morning it takes a lot longer to get ready. There's a lot of little bits and pieces like that, that you need to think about when going through medical school. So yeah, those were the hard parts, just figuring out how to, how to manage life in amongst all that. But you just persist. And so I used to get up at like crack of dawn, 3 AM, 4 AM, and then get to the hospital. And then go to the library after that and then study and study and study and then get the last tram home. And that's how I did it. But I just, it was actually just persistence and being relentless and just, just keep going and going and going and going.
Dinesh Palipana (Guest) · 23:31
Yeah. Wow. I'm hearing you and I'm putting myself in your shoes and just, it's mind-boggling to think what you went through to achieve that. Did at any time did you feel like giving up? Did you think, yeah, this is just too hard?
Aveline Clark (Host) · 23:48
Nah, nah, I do. I never want to give up. I did wonder, like, there were times when I'm like, how I'm gonna do this? I, I, I've asked myself that a number of times. I'm like, how on earth am I going to get through this? How am I going to do this? How, how is this going to work? Sometimes I wondered, will I get there? But I never thought, nah, I'm gonna stop. I just love this so much. Like, I love every day I'm at work. It doesn't feel like work. I'm sometimes there going, I can't believe I get to do this for a living. I love it so much. I just didn't want to let go and I didn't want to give up on it. That's how I got where I am. So yeah, no, it was just persistence. And, uh, pigheadedness and hammering away.
Dinesh Palipana (Guest) · 24:36
That's what creates the, the outcomes, right? We have to be persistent and believe in ourselves and have hope, like you said before. You mentioned before that you've got a book. Tell me about your book.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 24:47
I had a bunch of friends who said, um, you've got to write a book. Like, I had this one friend who doesn't read. He's like, I don't read, I hate reading, but if you wrote one, I'll read it. So they planted the seed in my head. So never written a book. This is the first time I've done it. I don't know what I'm doing, but this is fun. And one of the things I realized is, oh my God, I can't believe so much has happened. I'm 38 and I just couldn't believe so much has happened in my life. It just feels like I lived several lifetimes. So I was just reflecting on some of the experiences that I've had and some of the things that happened. And it was cool. The editorial process was, um, interesting. And just, uh, I think the fun part then is like looking at the COVID and picking out the photo for the COVID and all that, all that. So it was a great process and it was fun.
Dinesh Palipana (Guest) · 25:40
That's great. What's the name of your book?
Aveline Clark (Host) · 25:42
It's called Stronger.
Dinesh Palipana (Guest) · 25:44
Nice. I mean, look at who you are today, and physically, mentally, and always you probably a very much stronger person, right?
Aveline Clark (Host) · 25:53
I feel that way. I feel better.
Dinesh Palipana (Guest) · 25:56
So lovely to hear and see how you're living your best life. You're doing what you're here to do, and that is one of the most important things, I think.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 26:07
I feel very, very blessed. I feel very lucky.
Dinesh Palipana (Guest) · 26:11
Um, if there is someone listening to this story who can relate to any part of your story Is there something you'd like to share with them?
Aveline Clark (Host) · 26:20
I wish I could promise you that life was going to be straightforward. I wish I could promise you that there won't be any hardship. I wish I could promise you that everything will be smooth sailing, but I can't. What I can promise you is that you have more inside you, more potential, more strength, more power, and more resilience than you will ever know. And even though sometimes you may not be able to see the light, even though sometimes you may not be able to see the tomorrow, just take one step at a time and just keep going. And I promise you, you'll make it.
Dinesh Palipana (Guest) · 26:59
Wow. Thank you, Dinesh. That was beautiful. Really, really beautiful. Thank you for sharing your story and spending some time with me today. It's been a pleasure, and I'm just so grateful to you.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 27:11
Thank you, Evelyn. It's an honor. Thank you for having me today.
Dinesh Palipana (Guest) · 27:19
We hope you've enjoyed this episode of Katsugi Heroes. Please like and share the show to your friends so we can get this out to even more people. If you have a story you'd like to share with us, please reach out using the contact details below. And join us next week for our next hero's story. Until then, Keep being you, and remember that we are all heroes in our own unique way.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 27:47
Only when it's broken. Only when it's broken. When it hits you in the middle of the night.
You don't have to be in crisis to call.
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