When Gayle Shann suffered a horrific, life-changing farm accident 24 years ago, she fought like crazy to learn how to live again with the help of her beautiful husband, Mac.
“I’m extremely lucky,” insists Gayle – who runs Cantaur Park in Central Queensland with her husband Mac – to Woman’s Day.
“There are not many partners in the world who would do what Mac does for me.”
Gayle’s courage in fighting to rebuild her life – and Mac’s absolute devotion – so captured the nation’s attention when they first appeared on Australian Story in 2003, that the show has gone on to feature them another three times.
LOVE AT FIRST SIGHT
“We were a recently married young couple whose lives were turned upside down because of a catastrophic accident. I think that’s why our story resonated with the Australian public,” Gayle says, of the couple who met at a campdraft and married when she was just 24 and he was 21.
Listening back to the Triple 0 call Mac made on that terrible day when Gayle’s safety glove got caught in the spinning shaft of their tractor, causing her right arm to be ripped from her body, is incredibly hard, she says.
“Our lives changed forever in that instant,” Mac recalls.
Their episodes of Australian Story are now shown in schools around the country to inspire new generations of Aussies with Mac and Gaye’s resilience.
“My story is written on my body – in scars and missing limbs,” Gayle told the ABC previously.
MAC’S DEVOTION
“It’s an amazing diary to look back on and see how tough the tough times were, and how good the good times are,” Mac says. Gayle says the outpouring of love and support they’ve received from the nation makes her feel “warm and fuzzy”.
Gayle had to have her right arm and shoulder blade amputated and suffers complete paralysis in her left arm as a result of the accident, but she and Mac are still on their remote cattle station in Clermont, Queensland, where Gayle has taught herself to manage everyday tasks and farm work by using her feet instead of her arms and hands.
Gayle’s courage in learning to cope with life without her arms, and Mac’s devotion in helping her with everything from eating to removing her makeup, remains Australian Story’s most popular episode as the show notches up 30 years on air.
DRIVE TO SURVIVE
“It’s definitely been tough at times seeing Gayle in terrible pain,” says Mac, who together with Gayle continues to run their 11,000-hectare horse and cattle stud – she uses her feet to drive a buggy and tractor – and does the books with a special keyboard on the ground.
For 20 years Mac has done become her hands – cleaning her teeth, getting her dressed, feeding her meals.
“Mac has always made me feel that my body and disfigurements are normal. They are normal for him, and they’ve become normal for me,” she told the ABC in 2021.
While Mac says, her resilience has been nothing short of a miracle: “She has never once said, ‘I’m too sick or too sore’.”
Gayle, who made the difficult decision not to be a mum after her accident, still suffers from neuropathic pain in her left arm, but says with 14 nieces and nephews, and wonderful family and friends, their lives are full of love. At times she wondered if she’d be better off dead, but now, more than 20 years on, she never imagined she’d be as happy as she is.
“At the end of the day your priorities shift, and you realign with what you can’t do and try and build a life around that. Nothing is easy, but we still have a lot of living to do and we’re proud of what we’ve achieved,” she says.
With 300 baby calves running around, and Gayle’s beloved horses about to foal, Mac says he’s “grateful to live the life that we do” and “have the time to be together”, admitting he hates even spending one night away from Gayle.
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