Missing Person

When you become an amputee, you are immediately introduced to a revolving door of medical professionals: specialists, physiotherapists, and prosthetists. While these experts are incredibly skilled, there is a unique, almost unspoken connection that occurs when you meet a professional who truly “gets it” because they have walked in your shoes—literally.

In an episode of The Limb Shift podcast, I sat down with Jeremy McGrath, a man whose journey from a terrified child to a Paralympic athlete and professional Occupational Therapist (OT) offers a profound look at the “lived experience” of limb loss.

A Difficult Choice and the Journey to Recovery

Jeremy’s story began with a difficult choice. Born with a limb difference, doctors initially suggested amputation when he was very young, but the idea was terrifying. As Jeremy recalled:

“The doctors brought it up again to me. Probably I was about seven or eight or nine. I was pretty young and pretty, pretty horrified at the idea of it. Um, got pretty emotional. Didn’t want to do anything like that.”

However, the medical team explained that as he grew, his leg would continue growing and make his prosthetics “more unshapely heavy,” subsequently limiting his ability to run and remain active. By the time he was fourteen, having given up sport, Jeremy reached a turning point. He realised that delaying the surgery would only make things harder once he hit major life milestones like his Higher School Certificate (HSC), university, and his career.

“I just decided if I have to get this done and I want to kind of live a healthy lifestyle and not limit myself and get back to running and fitness, I just made that decision. I have to do it,” he explained. He placed himself on a waiting list and underwent the amputation at age fifteen.

The immediate aftermath brought a fresh set of physical and social challenges. Jeremy changed schools at the same time, spending three to four months on crutches while navigating an entirely new environment. Because his pre-amputation prosthetic relied on heavy strapping all the way up to his hip, his right quadriceps lacked strength, requiring rigorous pre- and post-operative physiotherapy.

Furthermore, the physical adaptation to the new socket was a slow, painful process. As Jeremy noted, “The swelling was really large and took a long time for that swelling to come down, so had quite a bit of pain in the shoe first adapting to that, um, that socket or that prosthetic.” It took a full twelve months before he could properly return to sport and fitness.

The Psychological Shift and Finding Rowing

While the physical recovery required immense patience, the psychological adjustment was an entirely different hurdle. During his teenage years, Jeremy battled deep insecurities and actively avoided drawing attention to his limb difference.

“Going through high school, I didn’t want my personality or everyone to just look at and identify me through my legs. So I actually wore through the whole of high school long pants. I didn’t like to really bring too much attention to it. Um, so yeah, I was a little bit insecure. Definitely.”

Before his surgery, Jeremy had spent ten years playing soccer, using his heavily strapped leg to “belt the soccer ball.” Post-amputation, he found that kicking a soccer ball with a prosthetic was vastly different: “Sometimes I would kick the ball and my leg would go flying further than the ball.”

Losing that athletic outlet left him adrift until his final year of high school in 2012. Watching the London Games reminded him of attending the Sydney 2000 Olympics as a six-year-old, where he had harboured early dreams of competing at the Paralympics.

Searching for an accessible sport, he looked into rowing, mistakenly believing it was strictly an upper-body discipline. He soon discovered that rowing is actually predominantly a lower-body sport driven by the initial leg drive. “I might not have chosen rowing if I knew that at the time, but I loved the sport,” Jeremy admitted.

Fascinated by the water and embraced by a supportive local club, his rise was meteoric. Training six to seven times a week and waking up at 4:00 am, he made his first World Championships in Amsterdam in 2014—just two years after picking up an oar—and ultimately competed at the Rio Paralympics in 2016.

For Jeremy, the true value of the Paralympic journey was not just the elite competition, but the profound psychological transformation it catalyzed:

“The main thing I got out of that whole experience was… the confidence, the fitness, being able to feel confident in my body and myself again, even if I didn’t make the Paralympics. I think growing and building all that and growing as a person was probably more influential on my life than necessarily the Paralympics.”

This newfound confidence completely changed how he carried himself; the teenager who once hid behind long pants completely abandoned them, choosing instead to wear shorts exclusively.

Landing in Allied Health

Jeremy’s career path was heavily influenced by a compassionate professional at Westmead Children’s Hospital during his adolescence. He recalled a physiotherapist “who not only was a great physio, but she really was a support for myself and my mother… I really felt cared for by her.”

Though he originally intended to pursue physiotherapy, he narrowly missed out on entry and “landed” in Occupational Therapy, initially planning to transfer after a year. However, once he discovered the holistic nature of OT, he fell in love with it.

While physiotherapy targets specific physical functions, OT evaluates daily living occupations in their entirety—from morning routines and parental duties to employment, leisure, and mental health. “I felt like, oh, this is a real opportunity where I can help people with more than just build up their physical strength, but be able to get back to doing things,” Jeremy shared, noting how perfectly it aligned with his own life philosophy of refusing to be held back.

Now a practicing clinician, Jeremy utilizes his personal history to break down barriers with his clients. Within the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) space, his background gives him a distinct advantage in establishing rapport:

“I think a lot of my clients, uh, when they find out that I, um, not just work in the NDIS but am a participant in the NDIS, I think they, they take that on board as, oh, this person not just knows about OT, but actually knows what it’s like to be in my shoes, um, and to have walked in them. So I think it really helps me build that rapport and understanding with clients.”

The Reality of Practice vs. Personal Habits

As an OT, Jeremy’s day-to-day expertise involves executing functional assessments, modifying homes, and prescribing assistive technology. This ranges from minor items like reachers to major mobility aids such as lift chairs, scooters, and hoists. Yet, despite nearly a decade in the field, Jeremy remains incredibly candid about his own shortcomings and the enduring pressure of maintaining a “stoic” persona.

Now in his early thirties and noticing the onset of back soreness, he has begun evaluating his own home for fall hazards, yet admitted that he does not always follow his own clinical advice:

“I think I’m very aware of falls, risks and how easy it is to fall. And even right now, I do have some falls in the shower. Even though I am pretty fit, I can balance one leg really well. Um, I don’t necessarily follow the best practices all the time that I tell my clients to follow, but, um, I think, um, you just need to be open and understanding of how serious falls can be.”

He acknowledged that being a young man makes it incredibly easy to default to silence rather than reaching out. “Being a man, being a young man, I think I like to be pretty stoic and not ask for help. Yeah. I think if my wife is here right now, she would agree with me that often I don’t ask for help when I probably do need it,” he confessed, highlighting that coming to terms with vulnerability is a lifelong, unfolding process.

Advice for the Journey Ahead

Reflecting on the fifteen years that have passed since his amputation, Jeremy emphasizes that the absolute hardest part of his journey was keeping his struggles internalized. For anyone currently facing limb loss or navigating a major physical transition, his advice centers on breaking the cycle of isolation.

“Once again, I’m going to come back to being that stoic man. You often keep a lot of thoughts and challenges to yourself… But the more open you can be to the close people in your life, the more that these people can come and help. And you’re never in this by yourself. You know, um, even just in if it’s not just your therapist and, uh, your medical team around you, but your support networks or your family members, your friends, uh, all these people want to help you. Um, and people can only help if you’re, you know, brave enough to have those chats and let them know what you’re actually feeling and thinking and experiencing.”

Jeremy’s full, insightful story will feature in The Limb Shift podcast later in the year.

You can find out more about Jeremy’s business here.