A young sportswoman who crowdfunded £10,000 to have her leg amputated has become one of the world’s top para-canoeists.
Hope Gordon, 24, who only took up the sport a year ago, took a fifth place at last week’s world championships in Hungary.
The athlete, who had to self-fund her amputation after the NHS refused to remove her left leg, now has her sights set on the Paralympics in Toyko 2020.
Hope spent five years begging doctors to amputate her leg after an agonising neurological condition left her in a wheelchair at 16. She says that by losing it, she has gained a life.
Since her operation in 2016, she has represented Scotland in swimming, but it’s her switch in the last 12 months to para-canoeing that has led to her breakthrough on the international stage.
Hope’s incredible bravery and selfless determination has earned her the first nomination in our 2020 Young Scot Awards, in the Young Hero category.
The canoeist, from Rogart, Sutherland, who is also an ambassador for amputee charity Finding Your Feet, said: “For me, having my leg amputated wasn’t the end. It was just the beginning, and aimed me down what turned out to be a better path.
“I am a great believer that everything happens for a reason, although when I was in crippling pain and having to fight to have my leg removed it didn’t seem like that.
“Everything that has happened to me has shaped me in a positive way. It has taught me to appreciate life and not to take anything for granted, which is a great mantra to live life by.”
Hope earned last week’s fifth place in the 200m at the Canoe Sprint World Championships. She said: “It was pretty awesome after just 12 months in the sport, and there’s a lot more to come.
“There is only one place in Team GB for the Paralympics and at the moment I’m second in Britain in the women’s KL3 classification for athletes with trunk function and partial leg function.
“Final selection takes place in April so never say never, but even if I don’t make the next Games the future for me looks bright.”
Hope was within grasping distance of a place in the Scotland team at the Commonwealth Games as a swimmer, but her sporting ambitions reached a whole new level after she discovered her potential in canoe- ing. She finished fourth on her debut at the European Championships and fourth in her maiden World Cup race in Poland.
Recalling how she got into the sport, she said:“I was forwarded an email from two-time Paralympic swimmer turned para-canoeist Charlotte Henshaw. It was an advert looking for new athletes, and by pure chance I fell into one of the categories they wanted. I went for trials and last summer I was invited to become part of the full-time programme with British Canoeing.
“I’ve moved to Nottingham to train but try to get back to Scotland as often as I can to see my family. They are really chuffed about what I have achieved in a new sport in just under a year.”
Hope, who graduated from Edinburgh’s Napier University with a degree in sport science and exercise, trains six days a week at the National Water Sports Centre. It’s a far cry from the dark days before her operation.
She was 12 when a kickabout at school set off the neurological condition – complex regional pain syndrome (CRPS).
She said: “My leg basically stopped working. I went from being able to do anything I wanted to not being able to walk within the space of a day.
“After a lot of failed treatments and years of agony, being stuck in hospital for weeks at a time, I elected to have my leg amputated. But this went against the advice of doctors, who feared the pain could spread elsewhere even if they removed my leg.
“By 16 I was in a wheel- chair and the pain was so bad I could not bear anything touching my leg.
“I knew couldn’t go on, so I sought out one of the few private surgeons in the country who would agree to carry out the procedure. The main snag was the £10,000 cost.
“I just set up a crowd- funding page and shared it on social media. The support I had was just unreal and in August 2016 I had my left leg amputated above the knee.
“My life changed for the better overnight. The pain the doctors feared would spread never happened and, touch wood, it never will. It’s 100 per cent the best decision I ever made, and I hope my case will see guidelines changed when it comes to CRPS and amputation.
“Every case is different and I would like doctors to see each person as an individual and assess their circumstances accordingly.”
Hope, who was also a champion rower before the operation, has a prosthetic leg but admits: “We are not really friends at the moment. It’s uncomfortable to wear and makes me frustrated but I’m sure I will
get used to it in time.
“I get around great on my crutches, and as I’m in and out of a canoe all day it would be a hindrance if I wore it all the time.”
Hope is keen to help other amputees through her work as an ambassador with Finding Your Feet– the charity set up by quadruple amputee and Sunday Mail Great Scot winner Corinne Hutton. She said: “As a new amputee, it was great to chat to other people who had been through the same thing. They provide a service no one else can, as they can answer the practical questions only other amputees know the answers to.”
Hope is also delighted with her Young Scot nomination. She said: “I feel very humbled and honoured. I’ve met so many incredi- ble young people recently who have been doing their country proud, and I hope I can continue to do that.”
Do you know someone as talented and worthy as Hope? If so, nominate them today in one of the 13 categories listed below this story and they could succeed gay education rights campaigner Jordan Daly, who won the overall award in 2018.
Nominations are open via www.youngscotawards.com until February 23 and the winners will be named at a star-studded ceremony at Edinburgh’s EICC on April 23.
