The Journey begins…
In September 2019, I was in Lagos, Nigeria. I was teaching a workshop on Collaboration, the 17th UN Sustainable Development Goal. I was full of energy, excited to empower young people to put a dent in the universe. At the end of my session, we danced.
On Monday 16th September, I went to India to repeat the same talk and roadshow. India was the 58th country stamped in my passport. Both countries were a whirlwind of conversations, inspiration, and culture.
Two weeks later, I was sitting in the Delta Airlines Lounge in Boston, waiting to embark on a 36-hour trip. I was fit, healthy, a busy mother to my son, and a globetrotting startup founder with a massive mission.
In front of a room full of business travelers and airport staff, I collapsed and fell unconscious. Transported by ambulance, I began to die on the way to a local hospital in a coma.
I didn’t leave Lagos without a gift; however, it was one I wasn’t aware I had. I was carrying an invisible assassin in my bloodstream. Its name was Cerebral Malaria. Killing my blood cells, causing severe sepsis and complete organ failure had me gravely ill. My family prayed that the Artesunate would work. Doctors calculated my lifespan in minutes instead of years on three occasions.
I awoke with extensive damage to both my feet and right hand. Harvard doctors said there was no recovery plan or timeline to when and if I would ever be me. My body had atrophied and so damaged I could not stand, scratch my nose or hold a pen.
The restoration journey included 300 nights in eight different hospitals, 32 operations, multiple amputations, all during the COVID Crisis that had my city on lockdown. I was lonely and discouraged. My experience was relative to jail confinement locked in chronic pain and despair.
My life’s miracle is not a story of woe.
Before Malaria, I wore an invisible ‘Wonder Woman’ cape as a person hellbent to be more than my birthright ever predisposed. I aimed high, and my self-worth was woven in, and through the personas, I created to cloak the shame of childhood physical and sexual abuse, undiagnosed ADHD, two broken marriages, and a series of bad life choices.
Being physically, emotionally, and spiritually damaged and fractured alone in a hospital room, unable to move, brought me to a place of self-inventory and a crossroads of consciousness. I had to decide whether to remain ‘broken’ or ‘survive and thrive.’
The inspiration for my decision came from the oddest of places. Once out of ICU, I asked my son to put on Beyoncé’s Homecoming documentary that chronicled her return from having twins to being the first woman of color to headline at Coachella. Her perseverance became my motivation, and the empowering lyrics of her songs became my internal war cries.
Each night I would watch the entire movie, singing and dancing with Beyoncé in my head. As I moved with her and her amazing dancers in my hospital bed, I willed myself to get stronger. The day that I could raise my right arm above my head and wave at the nurse when she entered the room was the day that I knew I would walk again. It was not going to be easy or fast, but it was possible. I owe Beyoncé a debt of gratitude as my coach, giving me the determination to rise from the ashes like a Phoenix.
To rise and recover, I had a great deal of work I needed to do internally before the external could get addressed. But, first, I had to put love in place of anger and forgive both the mosquito and the COVID-19 virus.
I learned acceptance and vulnerability is an inside job. I gained a willingness to be indeed ‘seen’ as a hot mess instead of always poised and perfect. Doing so opened up my ability to bear witness and receive extraordinary kindness from strangers, nurses, and friends.
In March 2021, I became Australia’s first female bilateral osseointegrated bionic below-knee amputee.
As an ‘augmented person,’ I have learned to live with resilience, or ‘positive patience.’ While the world is coping with social distancing and masks, my ‘new normal’ correlates with how I tie my shoes or my six-point strategy to take a shower. I embody the ‘able’ of the disabled. I celebrate and excel in what I can.
Being alive to raise my son makes my glass more than half full of gratitude every day. He reminds me how much I save on pedicures and that I will never suffer a blister.
I have learned to love myself through my journey, not despite my scars, bionic limbs, and adjustable heights, but because these make me unique. I am different, not disabled. I am bold, bionic, and blessed.
What Now for me is this moment. I have learned to not focus on the past but look and act intentionally in the present. My memoir, Thank You, Mrs. Carter (in honor of the 250 nights Beyoncé was my bedside coach during my twenty-three-month recovery journey defying a virus and a parasite) will hopefully enable others to find hope and resilience during uncertainty.
I am now Stephenie 2.0, upstanding, empowered, and unstoppable, and continuing my mission to impact a billion lives by 2025 with WanderSafe.
As the world slowly emerges from lockdowns, we need not waste time lamenting what we lost or sacrificed during the pandemic but how to rebuild and redefine ourselves together.
This is now.
About Stephenie
On a mission to impact a billion lives by 2025 and democratize safety, Stephenie Rodriguez is the Founder and CEO of start-up JOZU FOR WOMEN INC, creative designer of the WanderSafe application, and the inventor of the international award-winning Shakti and Beacon non-violent personal safety systems.
Stephenie is a serial entrepreneur, an international citizen, a leading digital futurist, and an award-winning digital, mobile and social media strategist and speaker. Her clients included travel companies such as Sydney International Airport, SSP – The Food Travel Experts, Club Med Asia Pacific, Oakwood Asia Hotels, Accolade Wines, Wonderful Pistachios, Camilla, Jamie Durie, JR/DutyFree, Allied Mills, and Lincoln Indicators. In 2016, her career pivoted when a series of events inspired her to focus energy and efforts on working on global solutions in support of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Since then, she has raised more than $3m USD in funding R&D and development for her application WanderSafe.
Stephenie is also world renown as #themalariamiracle as she survived Cerebral Malaria and severe septic shock in September 2019 that had her hospitalized for more than 320 hospital stays on two continents. Since February 2020, Ms. Rodriguez has undergone more than 32 operations due to complications from medications during a two-week malaria/sepsis coma that left her feet and hands severely and permanently damaged. March 31, 2021, she became Australia’s first Bilateral osseointegrated female amputee.
Her book recounting her journey back from the jaws of death and amputations titled Thank You Mrs. Carter, for a thank you to Beyonce Knowles-Carter for her inspiration will be released in October 2021.
Her subject matter expertise on personal safety and global risk are second to none as a member of the US Department of State’s OSAC.gov Women in Security Council.
Recent Awards
- Travel Technology Innovator of the Year – Frontier Awards Cannes 2016
- Digital Disruptor of the Year 2017 – The Moodie Davitt Report bit.ly/MDDD2017
- WanderSafe Beacon – Best New Travel Accessory in Travel Retail 2019 by Frontier Magazine
Connect with Stephenie on Instagram, LinkedIn, or follow her on Twitter, and Clubhouse @Digitalgodess.