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Australian influencer, Stephenie Rodriguez who is about 52 years old has narrated how she got her two feet amputated and endured an 18-month nightmare when she contracted cerebral malaria from a mosquito bite during a visit to Lagos.
In a report by the Sydney Morning Herald, the single mother and digital entrepreneur said she had visited Lagos in 2019 to speak at a business gathering for travel executives. She said during the gathering, she and the invited guests were asked to assemble outside for a photo shoot next to a pool of stagnant water. She said it was while she was there that she got bitten three times by a mosquito on her left ankle.
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Armed with enough insect repellant, Rodriguez said she conscientiously doused herself in insect repellant but did not take any anti-malaria drugs because of the bad reaction she suffered when she took one sometime back.
”The organisers asked me to go outside for a photo shoot with delegates. They had drones, shot B roll [extra footage], and vox pops. It was filmed next to a pool of stagnant water. It was sunset. That’s when I believe I was bitten three times by a mosquito on my left ankle”
she said
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Days later after flying to India, Rodriguez said she began to feel tired and unwell but dismissed the feeling, describing it as ‘out of character’ and ‘compound jet-lag’. It was while she got to Boston that she had to be rushed to the hospital after she took ill at the airport and was struggling to eat and drink.
Wheelchair-bound and unable to stand from unbearable pain, Rodriguez underwent drastic surgery to have both feet amputated and replaced with above-ankle bilateral osseointegrated implants and mechanical feet.
“It’s bizarre, but I had to cut my feet off to walk again,”
she said.
Attached to the ends of each rod via an allen key are a pair of prosthetic feet that now allow Rodriguez to move freely again
But after thirty-six surgeries, Rodriguez is the first woman in Australia to receive the implants and mechanical feet which was developed by Australian professor, Munjed Al Muderis. The Iraqi who became a leading surgeon of robotic limbs convinced her that giving up her blackened dead feet was her only hope of walking again.
Following surgery and hours of painful rehabilitation, Rodriguez celebrated a recent achievement of being able to walk in a pair of 4cm kitten heels again.
“I never really felt ‘dressed’ until I had a pair of killer heels on; the higher, the better. That’s just the sort of girl I was… still am,”
she said.