Slipping the stump of her right arm into its custom-made fibreglass cast, Melissa Groenewold deftly manoeuvres its hook around a feeding bottle.
The capable 27-year-old then spins her electric wheelchair around and speeds off in the direction of her baby. Down the corridor, baby Amelia waits, semi-patiently, for her mummy’s attention.
The bub, now four months old, hasn’t noticed her mum’s missing hands and legs, which make her just a second or two slower than most mothers.
“I’ve never been worried about looking after a baby because I have no hands or legs,” says Perth’s Melissa, who delivered her perfectly healthy baby at 34 weeks. “I was far more concerned about the responsibility of looking after a child for life.”
At the age of 17, Melissa went home ill from her job in a daycare centre. Later that night, she awoke with her body covered in blotchy purple bruises the size of 50-cent pieces.
She’d studied meningococcal disease as part of her childcare certificate so knew straight away her life was in jeopardy. She rushed to hospital, arriving without a second to spare. The doctors managed to save her life, but they couldn’t save her limbs and within four weeks, Melissa’s legs were amputated. Two weeks later, her hands were too toxic to keep and they too were cut off.
“Having no hands or feet no longer gets me down,” says the new mum, stroking the head of her precious daughter.
“I thought I was content before she came along, but now my life is better than I could possibly have imagined.
“From the moment she was born, my instinct has been to stay with her for every second of every day.
“I didn’t realise there was this little black hole that she has completely filled. I love every second of being a mum and it feels like this is how my life was meant to be.”
Bathtime is manageable with some planning, says Melissa.
Handle with care
A typical 24 hours involves four feeds through the night, bathing, changing and usually one trip out in the car for supplies. With Melissa’s husband Wayne at work all day as an electrician, these duties fall to her.
“I bathe and change Amelia on our bathroom floor,” laughs Melissa, who finds humour in most things she attempts.
“I fill the bath, undress her using my hook, then gently put her in, laying her head in the crook of my left elbow. The trick is to never overfill the bath or over-soap it. This way, she can’t fall out of my grip.”
It’s hard to imagine how Melissa dresses her little tot, but somehow they make it work.
“I always make sure I buy loose and stretchy clothes that I can work with,” she says.
“Sometimes, though, I see a pretty dress with buttons, so I buy it and give it to my aunty Rita, who replaces the buttons with Velcro.”
Feeding, washing and dressing Amelia is all in a day’s work for Melissa, whose husband Wayne (far right) is at work all day.
On a roll!
Trips to Melissa’s local shops in Rockingham, around 40 minutes south of Perth, are done with the help of prosthetic legs, but mother and daughter also enjoy getting out in the wheelchair.
“I put Amelia in a sling and it takes us 20 minutes in the electric chair,” tells Melissa.
“Last week, she started crying, so I breastfed her in the sling all the way home from the shops!”
Future danger spots have already been identified by Melissa and Wayne, the first is “wheelchair vigilance” – being extra careful when their daughter starts crawling.
“I’m going to have to be hyper-vigilant about where she is so I don’t run over her,” says the first-time mum, pointing to a cave-like gap between the wheels of her mobile chair.
“And I’m concerned about Amelia being teased at school. Will her friends make fun of her because of me?
“Hopefully, they’ll just be open and inquisitive, like my nephew was when he first met Amelia. He said, ‘Look, she has hands,’ expecting she wouldn’t have any. I said, ‘That’s right, Levi – my hands are in heaven.’”
Despite the challenges, it’s clear that being a mother to little Amelia agrees with the former health promotion officer.
Melissa wants nothing more than to immerse herself in the role of motherhood and enjoy her treasured gift.
“I’m loving everything, from watching her feisty little personality develop to squeezing her little bum cheeks,” laughs Melissa, who predicts that she and Wayne will have baby number two within three years.
“Having a disability like mine isn’t a reason to stop living.”
