Ann Blair’s daughters were playing in the sea, but there was something sinister lurking nearby…
Clearing up the breakfast table, I smiled hearing the chatter of excited voices in the bedroom.
‘Bring on the beach!’ my 15-year-old daughter Lulu said.
‘We might find sea urchins,’ her twin Ellie replied.
My girls were identical and inseparable.
They did everything together, from playing basketball to gym sessions.
I’d left my husband Joe back home looking after our other children Maggie, 11, and 10-year-old son, Tripp.
This was a four-day mum and daughter holiday in Florida.
Some friends had joined too.
After breakfast, we headed to the shore.
Before us stretched beautiful white sand and crystal clear water as far as the eye could see.
As the girls ran into the sea, I lay down nearby with my friends.
This is just perfect, I thought.
A while later, me and some of the mums decided to head back to our rented house.
‘See you later!’ I called to the girls.
After getting some more things, we headed to a nearby cafe for lunch.
Then as we walked back to where the girls were, we noticed a large crowd had gathered by the water.
‘Why are all those people there?’ I asked Ellen.
‘There’s a shark by the football in the water!’ someone nearby shouted.
What? I thought.
I looked out to sea and, sure enough, there was a football floating near the shore.
‘I’ll call the kids,’ Ellen said in
a panic.
I watched with my heart in my mouth while she dialled her daughter’s number.
‘There’s no answer,’ she said.
Instinctively, we started running towards the throng.
We had to find
our girls.
I carried on running, thinking Lulu and Ellie would suddenly appear before me.
Then something made me stop in my tracks and look back.
There, on the ground, was Lulu.
In my panic, I’d run past her.
‘Oh my god,’ I cried.
She was partly covered by a towel but her face was as white as a ghost.
Suddenly, Ellie was there too.
'There's a shark in the water!'
‘Mum, it’s Lulu,’ she said. ‘She’s been bitten by a shark.’
I started screaming, unable to control myself.
When I looked closer, I saw Lulu’s thigh protruding grotesquely, a mass of flesh and blood.
The beast had taken a chunk out
of it.
Ellie knelt down and gently tried to keep Lulu’s eyes open.
I grabbed Lulu’s hand.
‘I love you,’ I said to her, begging her to stay awake.
Doctors and nurses who’d been on the beach offered to help.
‘Mum, she’s going to be OK,’ Ellie said.
‘No she’s not, she has no leg!’ I cried.
Frantically, I called Joe’s number.
‘Lulu’s been bitten by a shark,’ I told him.
Minutes later, an ambulance arrived and Lulu was loaded on to it.
I ran back to the house with my friend Kelly and Ellie. We grabbed some things, and in a daze started driving.
Just breathe, I thought to myself, willing Lulu to live.
During the hour drive to hospital, Ellie turned to me.
‘Mum, Lulu lost her hand too,’ she said.
I froze in horror.
I hadn’t seen the rest of Lulu’s body because she was partially covered up.
How was she going to survive with no arm and perhaps no leg?
At last, we arrived and I ran into A&E and grabbed a doctor.
‘My daughter was bitten by
a shark. Do you know if she’s OK?’ I asked.
‘She’s alive, she’s in surgery,’ he said. ‘She’s lost her left hand and we’re trying to save her leg.’
I almost collapsed in relief.
I realised I could cope with anything as long as I still had my little girl.
But later, another doctor approached.
And the news wasn’t good…
Surgeons had been forced to amputate
her leg above the knee because
her femoral artery
had been severed.
‘People normally
die within seconds
of that happening. The fact she’s alive
is a miracle,’ the doctor explained.
I was devastated she had lost her leg but I repeated, ‘She’s alive, she’s alive.’
When Joe came, I collapsed into his arms, sobbing.
Finally, two hours later, Lulu was out of theatre.
She was intubated and her body was swollen, but she was still with us.
I sat next to her and gently held her hand.
In the middle of the night, she woke up. She pointed to the space where her leg should
have been.
‘It’s gone, sweetheart,’ I said.
In that moment though, I knew she was still the same Lulu.
The following morning, Ellie came in, bent down and hugged her twin.
Then she sat down next to her and held her hand, making a heart shape with her fingers to show Lulu she loved her.
‘She’s doing really well, we can take the breathing tube out tomorrow,’ the doctor said.
I was overwhelmed with relief.
But still dark thoughts threatened to overwhelm me.
How will she be treated without an arm and leg? I fretted. How can she have a normal life?
Next day, Lulu spoke for the first time.
‘I made it,’ she whispered.
‘You did, honey,’ I replied, tears rolling down my face.
She and Ellie slowly explained what had happened.
‘We had been looking for sea urchins and were swimming back when suddenly someone screamed “Shark!”,’ Lulu said. ‘I looked down and saw the shark’s big body and we all just started swimming for our lives.’
Lulu said she felt something and instinctively lifted her arm out of the water.
‘Mum, my hand was missing, there was just flesh and bone,’ she told me. ‘I tried to scream
but nothing came out.’
She said,
even though
she felt no pain, she knew that the shark had then latched
on to her leg.
Someone then ran into the water and punched
the shark.
‘I blacked out in the strangers’ arms and the next thing I knew I was coming round on the beach,’ she added.
Lulu said she remembered trying to focus on breathing and keeping her
eyes open.
She also felt someone putting
a tourniquet round her wounds
to try and stop the bleeding.
That person almost certainly saved her life.
As I listened to my girl, I couldn’t believe what she’d been through. She remembered every bit of it.
Next day, despite her injuries, Lulu was able to sit up.
My girl was so determined!
Her fitness from playing basketball and volleyball meant she was strong and was recovering quickly.
Five days
later, Lulu was transferred to a rehabilitation unit where I stayed with her.
'Mum, my hand was missing'
More surgery followed, which allowed her to have a state-of-the-art prosthetic hand.
One night, Lulu cried for the first time since the attack happened.
‘Losing an arm and a leg does not define you,’ I told her. ‘It’s how you cope with it that
defines you.’
After that, she rarely complained.
Lulu’s determination to get better astounded the physiotherapists.
She out-performed every task they set her.
Sometimes she’d get frustrated, but she was never angry.
And she never once said,
‘Why me?’
Instead, she said, ‘Why not me?’
Two and a half months after the shark attack, Lulu came home.
She’s now back playing golf, volleyball and basketball.
Her bond with Ellie and the friends who were on the beach that day is stronger than ever.
I know these girls will have each other for life.
She has since launched the Lulu Strong Foundation (lulustrong.com).
It aims to raise funds and awareness for better prosthetics for amputees which are still woefully inadequate.
Lulu’s set her sights on becoming a doctor, a motivational speaker and
a paralympic athlete.
My daughter lost her arm and leg, but it hasn’t stopped her.
It’s made her stronger.
For Lulu, the sky’s the limit.
Ann Blair Gribbin, 44