Claudine: Thank you so much for speaking to me today! You’re such an inspirational woman, and I really wanted to share your phenomenal story with our readers. Tell me, how did you get into your career in acting? 

Kelly-Marie: From a young age, I was always into acting, like theatre stuff and small parts in shows, but then what happened was I got to the age where all my friends were getting mortgages and having kids. I was still pretty young, but as I was in and out of acting work, I thought it was about time to get something more secure, so I went working on the airlines as cabin crew. Unfortunately, while I was working on the airlines, I became paralysed, so of course, I couldn’t do that job anymore. I thought to myself, what am I going to do now? I had bills to pay, but I was now in a wheelchair! So, I went back to my roots and pushed for more roles in acting. Luckily, I managed to get that break and landed my role in Hollyoaks.

Claudine: You said you became paralysed while working on the airlines; what happened? 

Kelly-Marie: I got an infection in my spine called Guillain-Barre Syndrome, which paralysed me from the waist down. Essentially it means that your own body goes to war with itself, and your immune system starts attacking, causing your body to drain the fluid from your spinal cord. It happened really quickly, and there was nothing I could do.

Claudine: Did you have any signs beforehand that something was wrong? 

Kelly-Marie: Looking back, I had a nasty bout of food poisoning before this happened. Most people who get this start with being really run down or quite ill, like the flu. I thought I was over the worst of it, but I still felt terrible. I was aching all over and felt like I was walking on sponge. I was back at work at this point, but one day on my way home, I realised I couldn’t gauge the speed in my car. I thought there was an issue with the car at first, but I soon realised it was actually my legs. I went straight to my GP, who realised there was an issue and sent me to the hospital. The doctor never told me how serious it was; I was only 21 then, and he didn’t want to worry me. I didn’t realise how sick I was myself. While on the ward, I decided to go the toilet on my own against the doctors’ advice, and my legs collapsed. I spent 10 months in hospital, completely paralysed. 

Claudine: Oh wow, you must have been terrified.

Kelly-Marie: I thought I would be ok, to be fair; I thought I’d walk out. It never entered my head that I’d never be able to walk again. At the time, I knew nothing, but my parents had been told what was going on, and it was  only later I was told that it could have been much worse. if it had not stabilised at my waist, I actually could have been paralysed up to my neck! I felt like the first time it hit me was when I spent 6 weeks in rehab. The nurses said they’d exhausted everything, and rather than getting me walking again, they’d need to rehabilitate me to live in a wheelchair. That was a shock. It was a scary time.

Claudine: How did you cope mentally with this shocking news?

Kelly-Marie: When I look back, it’s such a blur; I may have blocked it out. But the strength of my family and friends helped me get through; they were so strong. My friends were amazing, and I had so much positivity around me. When I first went out with friends in my wheelchair, Liverpool wasn’t great for accessibility; however, the people in Liverpool are so incredible, and they pulled together to help me get into bars and clubs; even the bouncers would throw me over their shoulders and carry me in. It’s so much better in Liverpool now for Wheelchair access.

Claudine: What an incredible story. You said you went back to acting. Can you tell us how you got into Hollyoaks? 

Kelly-Marie: As I say, acting has always been my passion, so when I had to leave the airlines, I looked into agencies who could help me find roles, and I found one that specialised in disabled actors. I went for a few roles in adverts, but then I auditioned for a part in Hollyoaks and got it! I was actually the first disabled actress to get a main part as an actress in the UK. At the time, I didn’t think it was a big deal, but it opened doors for me and the rest of the industry to hire more actors and actresses with many different diversities. What I loved most with Hollyoaks was that they allowed me to share real-life experiences on screen of what it is like being a young woman in a wheelchair rather than what they ‘think’ a young woman in a wheelchair would do. 

Claudine: So, how did you end things in Hollyoaks?  

Kelly-Marie: It wasn’t dramatic or anything. When I fell pregnant with my first baby, the producer at the time was so good about it and ended up writing in the story that Hayley (my character) was also pregnant. I went off for my maternity leave intending to return, but during that time, we got a new producer who didn’t end up writing my character back in.  

Claudine: What have you been up to since? 

Kelly-Marie: Having a baby while being in a wheelchair really opened my eyes to the fact that disabled mums and dads are completely not catered for in terms of equipment. I think the issue is that people aren’t used to seeing disabled mums, and it’s not because disabled mums aren’t having babies; it’s just that they are not catered for. People think there is no market for it, but there absolutely is! I work closely with a few different disability charities to help campaign about this (and many other things), but sadly things still haven’t changed.  

Claudine: That’s crazy – I hope a manufacturer is reading this right now! OK, your story is incredible and inspiring, but it doesn’t end there because you now have full use of your legs and are no longer in a wheelchair, which is amazing! Can you tell us what happened?  

Kelly-Marie: Well, let me just make this very clear from the outset, this wasn’t an overnight thing. It began on holiday when I saw a paraplegic man swimming and asked him how he did it. He said he could do it with upper body strength, so I tried it. My mum was panicking, thinking I would drown, but much to our surprise, I could still swim. So, I started swimming regularly, then later joined the gym, where I went and did the toning tables. My lower body muscles had completely wasted away by not using them, and I had dropped to just 5.5 stone. Gradually, my muscles started to recover, and one day when I tried to move my foot, my toe started to twitch. The Doctor dismissed me at first, but I started researching and found that someone else had been through something and they’d fully recovered. The more I dug for information, the more I found out, and so many people had got back on their feet and walked again. It took 11 years of physiotherapy and rebuilding my muscles, and I did so much better over time.