Kintsugi Heroes
Shanice Green · 62 min
Born into a body that fought her at every turn, Shanice Green survived nineteen surgeries, paralysis, and chronic pain to become a wheelchair-using empowerment coach who transforms the lives of women just like her.
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Shanice Green was born into a body that required immediate intervention. Her first months brought a bowel condition doctors dismissed until her father forced them to take action. At six, a nurse spotted a spinal curvature no one else had noticed during a routine hospital discharge. Brain surgery followed at Great Ormond Street Hospital to unblock fluid trapped around her spinal cord, surgery her parents were told was necessary to keep her alive.
At ten, after what was supposed to be routine surgery, Shanice woke paralyzed from the neck down with no warning. She had to learn to move, eat, and sit up all over again in a crowded rehabilitation ward two hours from her family, growing up mentally and emotionally at a speed no child should have to. She survived nineteen surgeries, chronic pain every single day, and a surgeon's words at nineteen that there was only one more operation possible for her. That moment lit a fire inside her. She had to ensure her children would be financially stable, because she did not know if she would wake up the next day.
When a woman she knew reached out, too self-conscious to use a wheelchair in public, Shanice offered to coach her for free for a month. Within four weeks, that woman sent her a photo out with her family, using her wheelchair without shame. That was when Shanice knew this was her calling. Now a wheelchair-using empowerment coach, she works with clients by going with the flow, with no scripts, believing what needs to come up will come up that day. Her message to anyone listening: you are perfectly yourself just the way you are. Nobody can do you better than you.
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Kintsugi Heroes · Registered Australian not-for-profit · kintsugiheroes.com.au ↗