Jasmin’s life lessons
HANGING 20m in a snow crevasse and waiting almost a day to be rescued, a 22-yearold Jasmin Dorrington reflected on her life.
It was 1998 and Ms Dorrington was skiing in the Alps of her homeland Switzerland when a life-threatening event changed her life.
The professional snowboarder had years of experience on the snow but it didn’t prevent her from falling headfirst into a 20m deep crevasse covered in snow.
Luckily her board wedged in a bend and Ms Dorrington clung on for her life waiting 24 hours to be rescued.
Now 44, she reflects how the ordeal changed her life.
“Luckily I came out uninjured and wasn’t too badly affected. It took more of a mental toll on me to live a life with no regrets and achieving my dreams and goals,” Ms Dorrington said.
“I learnt a lot about myself and it drove me from strength to strength.”
Moving to Australia, Ms Dorrington has spent the past 15 years working seven days a week in community welfare with non-profit children’s charity The Smith Family.
She has also self-funded her hobby farm Bilambil Pet Paradise that takes in other people’s horses to train, retrain and rehome. That venture inspired her to become an equine dentist last year.
But on August 14 this year, Ms Dorrington faced another life-threatening event when one of the 18 horses on the farm kicked her, leaving her
with four broken ribs and serious liver and kidney injuries.
Spending six days on life support and recovering from her horrific injuries, she was dealt another blow on September 20 when the aftermath of the event caused inflammation to her sciatic nerve, leaving Ms Dorrington paralysed on the right side of her body.
“It took eight weeks of laying still on a massage table, relying on full care and icing my spine every one and a half hours to get the inflammation down, which is slowly giving me movement back and I finally can start some rehabilitation,” Ms Dorrington said.
“I’m going to have to stay on top of it otherwise I could be paralysed again.
“It’s a scary thought. The whole thing was pretty scary, just realising how quick things can change.
“I had been living life fullon leading up to the event, working non-stop for 15 years.
“As I hardly ever had a sick day, The Smith Family have provided accrued sick leave and to cover what I do in my normal day it has taken five people to replace me.
“Having to learn movements again and being prevented from progressing because of my body has taught me to slow down and be patient.
“Another life-threatening event has taught me another lesson in life.”
Although her activities are limited, Ms Dorrington can’t be stopped, recently opening her business EIE – Equus Integrated Experiences.
The business provides a variety of horse experiences from pony rides at birthday parties to natural horsemanship training to handling and riding horses for beginners to the advanced.
The go-getter is also hopeful to be fit enough soon to take up an offer to rescue brumbies near Coffs Harbour.