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Tominey Reid: Heartwarming update on Melbourne woman who fell seven storeys from apartment a year ago
A woman who was told she'd never be able to walk again after falling from a seventh-storey balcony has revealed the moment she made the 'conscious decision' to let go of the ledge and plummet to the ground.
Tominey Reid, 21, was video chatting with her boyfriend, who was holidaying in Europe, when she dropped her phone from their seventh-floor Melbourne flat in July 2023.
She watched as her phone landed on the neighbour's balcony below and, after unsuccessfully knocking on their door, decided to reach from her own balcony to retrieve her phone herself.
However, Ms Reid slipped and held onto the rail of her balcony for five minutes, feeling her fake nails snap off one-by-one, before finally letting go.
'I was hanging over the balcony ... I made the conscious decision to let go because I was getting too weak to hold on anymore,' she told A Current Affair on Thursday.
Ms Reid fell 21 metres and crashed onto a glass fence - which likely saved her life by breaking the fall.
Her long list of horrific injuries included a torn artery in her heart, snapped femur, shattered knee cap, torn ligaments and multiple brain bleeds.
But she'd already defied the odds by surviving the fall from seven storeys up - which has a 90 per cent fatality rate.
Tominey Reid (pictured in hospital after her fall) fell seven storeys from her apartment balcony in July, 2023
Ms Reid (pictured last year) held onto her balcony railing for five minutes while feeling her fake nails snap off before she decided to let go
Ms Reid did the impossible again this year when she started walking with only the aid of a brace on her right leg.
Last year, Ms Reid told Daily Mail Australia she was determined to prove her doctor wrong by learning to walk again.
'The doctor said to me there's a big chance that I won't ever be able to walk again and it could take three to four years for my nerve to grow,' she said at the time.
'It's heartbreaking. I was really upset for that one day.
'But I've had a bit of a think about it and I am determined to prove that doctor wrong. I've defied all the odds so far so I'd like to think there's a big chance that I could possibly walk again in the future.'
One year on from the life-changing accident, Ms Reid hopes her mistake can be a lesson to other young Australians.
'I think it's a good message for young people to know that they're not invincible,' she told A Current Affair.
'Have more thought into the decisions you make because this has impacted my life forever and phones are replaceable.'
Speaking for the first time about her accident, Ms Reid previously told Daily Mail Australia last year she 'immediately regretted' the decision to retrieve her phone.
'I don't remember the fall but I do remember slipping and it just... my heart just dropped,' she said.
'I could see my phone on the sixth floor balcony. I could see the light of it and I thought that I was able to reach their balcony from our balcony.'
Ms Reid had not been drinking: it was, she said, a 'freak accident' sparked by a 'silly' decision she will regret for the rest of her life.
The sickening impact of her fall was heard by a retired policeman living in the same building, who immediately rang emergency services.
Ms Reid had partially landed on a glass fence - shattering it in the process - which may have broken her fall.
Ms Reid (pictured) has proven her doctor wrong by learning to walk again after suffering a torn heart artery, snapped femur, shattered knee cap, torn ligaments and multiple brain bleeds
Ms Reid had dropped her phone from her balcony (pictured) to her neighbour's below and fell when she tried to retrieve it
A year on from her accident, Ms Reid (pictured) has learned to walk again with only the aid of a brace for her right leg
Her right femur, the strongest bone in the human body, had snapped in half and was sticking 11cm out the back of her thigh.
'I broke the sciatic nerve in the same leg, which is why I'm currently in a wheelchair,' Ms Reid said.
'I shattered my left knee cap, tore my ACL (anterior cruciate ligament), my MCL (medial collateral ligament), other ligaments and broke my tibia.
'I had multiple brain bleeds, a tear in my heart and had ruptured my spine from neck to thorax.'
But she would only learn of this later.
Doctors at The Alfred Hospital placed her in an induced coma in intensive care for four days, fearing they would have to drill a hole in her head to stop the swelling on her brain.
'I had about six surgeries before I had even woken up and I lost 11 litres of blood,' Ms Reid said.
Her next real memory was waking up in intensive care to see various family members by her side, some of whom had flown down from Townsville.
‘Everyone was calling it a miracle that I had survived because it's a 10 per cent survival rate from seven stories and I survived without being paralysed or even brain damaged,' Ms Reid said.
Well-wishers have donated almost $55,000 to a GoFundMe page set up by her aunt to help alleviate the financial burden of being unable to work for the foreseeable future.
After a week in intensive care, Ms Reid was moved to a neuro-trauma ward where specialists reconstructed her knee.
They also took nerves from her left leg to help repair the damaged sciatic nerve in her right leg.
In all, Ms Reid underwent around ten surgeries.
'I've got no feeling or movement past my knee and it can take up to four years for the sciatic nerve to grow back,' she said.
Despite the intense agony from her injuries, Ns Reid masked the extent of her pain in a bid to convince doctors and nurses to discharge her before her 21st birthday.
Her plan worked: after spending five weeks in hospital, she was handed a discharge summary 16 pages long on September 1 and had a special gathering at a local pub on the Saturday with friends and family.
'It was really emotional,' she said. 'My pop did a speech and so did my dad.'
Ms Reid (pictured last year) previously told Daily Mail Australia: 'I've got no feeling or movement past my knee and it can take up to four years for the sciatic nerve to grow back'
Ms Reid (pictured) hoped her accident could be a lesson for other young Aussies that they're 'not invincible'
Ms Reid one message to other young people was to 'be happy with what you have' and appreciate your health.
'I used to hate my legs. I used to think I looked nicer in pants and would rarely wear shorts or a skirt,' she said.
'Now my legs are all busted up. I have scars literally all over them and I've got a rod in my leg where they repaired my femur.'
