One moment, Andrea Calleja (above with his parents Maria and Antonio, centre, his uncle Nick, left, and girlfriend Karen) was a strong athlete, full of life and ambition, a sportsman who enjoyed tough competitions that brought all his abilities to the fore.
The next moment, Andrea was being rushed to hospital, not knowing if he was going to survive and, if he did, not knowing whether he would be able to walk again, much less compete.
Andrea was taking part in the competition known as The Grid last October, when tragedy struck. He suffered a serious spinal injury when he slithered down an inflatable slide into a pool of water.
Life had changed abruptly for the 31-year-old. These last few months have been a constant battle for him to regain the skills we all take for granted.
It has not been easy. And it is expensive too. This is what has pushed his family into launching a crowd-funding exercise to be able to pay for all the treatment and rehabilitation that Andrea needs.
This is the challenge that Andrea is facing now. And, when there’s a challenge, Andrea does not hold back. It’s as if the bigger the test, the harder he tries. “I want to get my life back” he said in comments to The Malta Independent from Rome, where he is currently undergoing rehabilitation treatment.
His target is to at least start walking again.
He feels more encouraged knowing there is a challenge, his mother Maria told this newspaper in an interview at our offices.
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The days in hospital
Andrea showed his true character and fighting spirit right from the start, in the difficult hours and days that immediately followed that day.
Emanating pride in spite of a trembling voice, Maria said Andrea did everything within his power to ensure he moved out of the Intensive Care Unit following the accident. She said that doctors had told him that a breathing tube that had been inserted into the windpipe would normally be removed after 90 days. Well, Andrea’s condition allowed him to have it removed after 86 days. That was a small, but significant victory that gave him even more courage on the road to recovery.
Maria explained that although those four days might mean little to the normal person, for Andrea it meant everything “because it meant that he was getting out of the ITU four days before”.
Going back to the terrible experience that the family went through on 8 October 2022, Maria said that unlike previous obstacle races her son took part in, she was too tired to attend this one.
She recalled how it was Andrea’s father Antonio who had informed Maria of the whole ordeal. After the race their son was to meet his father for a typical father-son date-bonding over a football match game. Instead, the family went to hospital as Andrea was fighting for his life.
The family understood the severity of the injury just when they arrived in hospital. Karen Vella, Andrea’s girlfriend, who was also a participant in The Grid, explained what had happened.
Andrea had hit his head on a rock and became paralysed there and then. Maria said that he had remained conscious throughout all of this “but could do nothing”, could not move. She also added that the amount of water he had swallowed made the situation even worse for him.
It resulted that Andrea had injured vertebrae C3 and C4, which in turn seriously damaged his spinal cord. From feedback given by doctors, Antonio said that Andrea was told that he might regain some mobility in his upper body, however, the same result was not guaranteed for his lower body.
Maria, with tears in her eyes, recalled how the family was always worried that Andrea would injure himself while riding his motorbike; instead, he was injured while taking part in a sports event. “Everyone’s destiny is written,” she said.
The rehabilitation
Andrea spent Christmas in hospital, from where he was later transferred to Karen Grech rehabilitation hospital. He exhausted every kind of physiotherapy option he could have benefitted from in Malta between January and March, following which he went to Rome where for the past five months has been undergoing specialised physiotherapy.
Maria said that Karen and Andrea, whom she described as being soulmates, work together to better his situation. Apart from spending as much time with him as possible, Karen also helps Andrea carry out research that comes in handy in his recovery.
“Unfortunately, here we don’t have a spinal unit,” Antonio said, adding that although the family has nothing but praise for the physiotherapy he was being given at Karen Grech rehabilitation centre, the medical section lacks the necessary equipment that Andrea needs.
Andrea has now managed to regain mobility in both hands up to his wrists. However, in order to attempt to regain some mobility from his waist down, in the coming months Andrea will be travelling to Thailand, where a hospital there specialises in the treatment that the family said he requires.
Andrea and his girlfriend came across a new form of treatment for severe spinal cord injuries. In Thailand, Andrea will be operated on his spine, where two small microchips will be placed, one on his upper spine and one on his lower part.
The treatment, which is also known as epidural stimulation, will allow the chips to communicate and transfer information to the brain which in turn sends signals to the body to produce movements.
In describing what she felt when Andrea and Karen informed her of the decision to go to Thailand, Maria said that “all we can do as parents is to be supportive”.
She said that Andrea is the kind of person who needs to be aware that he has gone through all options before giving up on something.
New type of normality
Contacted via internet in Rome, Andrea said that although regaining 100% of his mobility back is almost impossible, this new treatment may guarantee a new type of normality, where he could start walking again with the aid of walking sticks. Additionally, the chip implanted in the upper part of the body may also give him back mobility of his fingers.
Having already turned to the generosity of the public to fund his treatment in Rome, collecting around €83,000, Andrea is now hoping to also cover his operation in Thailand through the same means.
In total the operation, without counting travelling expenses, adds up to a whopping €150,000. This is the amount of funds that the family is hoping to reach through this crowd-funding initiative.
This has to be paid by the beginning of November with the surgery taking place later that month.
Asked what this means for him, Andrea said that he is trying to get his life back.
“I lost many things in these last 10 months (since the accident happened) … they seemed like eternity especially when you would have to spent weeks or months looking at the hospital ceiling, while combatting an infection,” he said.
He said that this would also mean more time with his family and work as an insurance agent “which is very important to me”.
Andrea is also doing his part to raise the funds he needs by selling his car, an Alfa Romeo, and motorcycle, a Kawasaki Ninja 400.
Life after the accident
Andrea recognises the fact that he needs to adapt to his new life. He said that the first thing he remembers as soon as he opened his eyes is that “three men came to give me a bath”, adding that never in his life did he imagine he would be in such a situation.
He said that if one does not accept their new future, apart from making their own life miserable they will also have a negative impact on their loved ones.
Apart from working for himself, he also needed to work for his parents and girlfriend, who have assisted him all the way since the accident happened.
Andrea said that he used to be a very independent person; now, because of his condition, he has to ask people to do things for him.
“It’s not boring, it’s depressing, there are days where I want to close myself in a room and cry or break something,” he said.
Maria highlighted how before the injury he used to exhaust himself in a football game or through games on the PlayStation “but now he can do none of these”.
“Unfortunately, you have to light up a flame within yourself, which not everyone is capable of doing,” he said, adding that this is needed in order to fight.
Andrea said that until there is hope “I will continue to keep fighting, however I do not wish to remain like this as we had too many plans and ideas of things to do”.