The software engineer was hit by a truck on her way to work and lost her left leg. Her dreams fell flat and she thought she might never be able to live a normal life again.

But instead of making her disability deter her from achieving what she always aspired, she put up a brave face and decided to take life heads on. Here’s the inspiring story of national badminton champion Manasi Joshi, as told to the good folks at Human s Of Bombay.

“I was on my way to work on a two wheeler one day when a trucked rammed into me and completely crushed my leg. It wasn’t the driver’s fault – there was a pillar which hindered his vision. People around immediately took me to the hospital and even though it happened around 9:30 am I was only operated upon at 5:30 pm. The doctors tried to save my leg but after a few days it got infected and I had to be amputated. When the doctor told me, I asked him ‘why did you take so long? I knew for a while that this would happen.”

“What got me through this whole ordeal is acceptance – that this is my fate, now I can either choose to cry about it, or take it with a pinch of salt and push myself…I picked the latter. In fact when people used to come to visit me in the hospital and get emotional — I would tell them jokes to make them laugh!”

“So I took the physiotherapy, and began to learn how to walk all over again. My biggest fear was that I wouldn’t be able to play badminton which has been my passion since childhood — but somehow even while I was facing difficulty in walking…I could play. I began winning corporate badminton tournaments, and on the suggestion of one of my amputee friends decided to try out at a National Level. I went on to win several medals at the National level and, this year I won Silver in the Para Badminton World Championship held in England. I’ve trained for 5 hours a day, whilst juggling my job as a software engineer, almost completed my training in Scuba Diving and traveled pretty much all over India.”

“When people ask me, ‘how do you do so much?’ I just ask one question — ‘What’s stopping you?’”

“We para players need support from the government. There’s a need to construct disabled-friendly sports complexes, encourage para players and appreciate para-badminton as able-bodied sports.”