Self-discipline is a trait synonymous with farming, and for Michael Nixon it helped turn what could have been a devastating road of darkness, into an inspirational journey of discovery.
In October 2019, Mike was left paralysed from the chest down after losing his balance and falling 28-feet through an asbestos roof and onto concrete. At 32 years of age, doctors confirmed the unthinkable: that he would never be able to walk again.
It was a normal working day, and Mike was managing the calves on the 3,500-acre mixed farm he had been on since leaving Moulton College. It was raining and the gutter needed clearing and, as always, he did not think anything of it.
Accident
"The job needed doing," he says. "I got my mate to put me up in the loader bucket and take me up. I got out and walked along the beams either side of the gutter and thinking it would be fine, straddled it.
"I pulled a shrub that was growing inside but it snapped off in my hand and I lost my footing and fell back.
"I remember hitting the floor like it was yesterday.
"My friend came running in from outside and I told him I could not feel my legs. After that, the rest is blank."
Heavy rain prevented the air ambulance from taking off, so Mike was transferred to a road ambulance which drove 45 minutes to reach the hospital in Coventry.
"All my injuries were internal. I had broken my back, seven ribs and my sternum," he says. "It is ironic as up until that day I had not broken one bone in my body."
Three months later Mike was discharged from hospital and transferred to a rehab centre in Stoke Mandeville where he began the next stage of recovery, learning to live a new normal.
"My arms became my new legs and I worked on my upper body strength. As a farmer I am already an early bird so I would go for a swim at 6am, have my breakfast, go to the gym and physio and then back working on my arms and legs."
Mike was discharged from rehab in March 2020, just as the onset of Covid was taking hold and the nation entered lockdown. It was this time he struggled the most, so he called his friend to ask if he could help him on farm.
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Finding farming again
"I was amazed at how much I could actually do," he says. "I fed the cattle, did some fencing and other jobs and it just felt great to be back with the livestock and doing something physical. It was an absolute lifesaver."
Such is the power of a positive mindset, Mike continued his recovery, achieving new firsts and navigating his way through new territory.
Defying the odds, bungee jumps, completing the London Marathon, and securing a place on the wheelchair rugby team where they won silver for the UK all followed. He was also part of a series by AHDB, which aimed to show innovation in farming for a sustainable future.
"I have met some incredible people and it is a sport where you sit on that seat, and you are equal to everyone around you."
Farming, though, is in Mike's blood - his grandad was a farmer and weekends throughout childhood, he says, were spent on-farm.
So, through this passion and spurred on by his friend's encouragement, he began sharing his life after a spinal cord injury on social media, under the name @mikewheelchairfarming, in a bid to help others in a similar position and show how he is making a success of still being able to work in agriculture.
"I wanted to show people you can still achieve if you are willing to put the work in and how important your mindset is. I have enjoyed the positivity of Instagram and talking to others who are a mixture of non and able bodied."
Farming looks a little different now, but it is still an important part of his life. He has a battery powered strimmer blower and strimmer, plus an attachment on his wheelchair that allows him to move easier across the uneven ground.
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Smallholding
Back home in Northamptonshire, he and wife Marie recently secured a three-acre holding where they run chickens and rare breed sheep, and are building up their own enterprise with the intention of securing more land in the future.
With strength and fitness still key to his everyday life, he opened a specialist gym on site which now welcomes 31 members through its doors.
"Because of the location of my break, I should not have any working muscles below the chest and down, but I have got a bit in glutes and in my core.
"I did not really talk to anyone during my recovery but keeping active also kept my mind focused, and I honestly believe it is the farming discipline and that incredibly strong mindset it requires. You have to get up and go and do whatever you need to do."
When asked if he would do anything differently on the day that changed the rest of his life, Mike's advice is simple.
"Take that extra few seconds to do your checks and be as safe as you can be. You think it will never happen to you but that one day it did, and I am lucky to be alive."
But the countryside is where his heart is; the animals, the outdoors.
And though it is, he says, tough, he is carving out his own farming path and hoping he can inspire others to do the same.
