Mairead Clabby was enjoying a regular night out with her colleagues at the local pub until she was forced to intervene in a fight that broke out, leaving her with a life-changing condition
An ordinary night out at the pub with friends altered Mairead Clabby’s life forever.
The then 23-year-old volunteer police officer had gone for drinks with some colleagues on the Wirral, Liverpool, in December 2012. Despite being off-duty, the group of officers were called into action when a violent fight broke out between a couple. The woman was knocked unconscious.
But as Mairead called for medical assistance while her colleagues arrested him, the woman woke up and tried to force her way back to his side. Mairead stopped her for her own safety, but she became vicious, kicking Mairead in the stomach and dragging her to the floor before pulling her hair out and throttling her, reports the Manchester Evening News.
“It took three officers to restrain her in the end,” Mairead, now 36, recalled. “She pulled my hair and banged my head against the floor. I was left in a lot of pain.
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“I remember trying to get one of my colleagues, who I was giving a lift home, to leave because I could feel the atmosphere in the pub turning,” Mairead added. “But sadly I didn’t leave early enough.”
The young officer was left with what she initially believed to be muscular injuries to her neck and shoulder. But despite multiple rounds of physiotherapy over the five years following the assault, nothing was improving.
“It was making me quite sick at times,” she explained. “I thought there could be something else at play but I didn’t ever have any scans.”
As time passed, she noticed her strength diminishing. “I couldn’t lift things in the office, my arm was getting shaky, I was getting quite weak and it was getting to a point where after my shift I was having to have a rest for four or five hours, get up for a little bit, and then go back to bed,” she shared.
“I knew something was going wrong. I was bumping into things, I wasn’t able to write and type properly and I was losing feeling down like my right arm.”
Mairead returned to her GP and was initially advised to undergo another round of physiotherapy. However, she chose to consult a different doctor who referred her for an MRI scan.
The scan revealed four herniated disks in her neck and a chiari malformation – a condition where brain tissue extends into the spinal canal, often resulting from severe whiplash. “At that point, I was the illest I’d ever been,” Mairead remembered. “I had put on around seven stone, and I wasn’t really mobile.
“I had been a competitive athlete before the assault, but I was struggling doing walks around the block. It was a huge adjustment and it was really getting me down.”
She was referred to the Walton Centre, a specialist neurology hospital in Liverpool, where she was offered surgery to remove one of the affected disks and replace it with a graft. “It was life-changing straight away,” she revealed.
“As soon as my feet hit the floor walking around the ward I haven’t really stopped. I lost about three stone in three months just from walking again.”
After receiving support from the Police Treatment Centre, Mairead started rebuilding her life inch by inch. A year ago, she even laced up her running shoes and returned to a sport where she had previously excelled. Under the guidance of Olympic athletes Eilish McColgan and Michael Rimmer, she is on the road to regaining fitness and strength.
“Things are so different to how they were,” she shared. “I’m still on medication for my nerve pain and I’m still under the Walton Centre but the operation was really a turning point.”
Mairead is all set to tackle the AJ Bell Great Manchester Run this Sunday (18 May) as part of her efforts to give back to the Walton Centre that aided her recovery. She exclaimed that she’s thrilled to face the challenge and will share the starting line with Greater Manchester’s own Keely Hodgkinson, who is also participating.
“I’m really looking forward to taking part and raising money and giving back to the Walton Center because they’ve obviously done so much for me,” she expressed. “I think the atmosphere is going to be great!”
You can donate to Mairead’s fundraiser here.