When Stephenie Rodriguez contracted cerebral malaria from three mosquito bites during a 2019 business trip to Lagos, Nigeria, doctors gave her a two percent chance of survival. She spent over 300 days in hospital, endured nearly 40 surgeries, and ultimately became the first woman in Australia to receive above-ankle bilateral osseointegrated implants and mechanical feet.
Most people would have called that the end of one life and the beginning of a quieter one. Stephenie called it the starting line.
Discovering a New Discipline
Wheelchair fencing found Stephenie through an NDIS newsletter. Despite having no prior sports background, something about the discipline resonated with her. She turned up to her first training session to discover she was the only participant.
"I've always thought that fencing was a cool and kind of a dignified sport," she said. "If I was going to do any, it would probably be the one that would be most interesting. I don't have a sports background, but I will admit that fencing found me."
After just three lessons, her coach saw potential and suggested she could represent Australia. Stephenie took the idea and turned it into what she calls a "big, hairy, audacious goal" — qualifying for the Paris 2024 Paralympic Games.
Building the Program from Nothing
There was no Australian women's wheelchair fencing program before Stephenie arrived. She became the first Australian female to compete internationally in the sabre since 1960. Through her advocacy and persistence, the program has grown to include five women and an under-11s development squad.
"There wasn't a program before me, so I've had to lead the way," she said. "I'm the first female to fence with my weapon of choice, the sabre, to represent Australia since 1960."
She demonstrated her belief in the Paris goal in the most tangible way possible — purchasing tickets to the opening and closing ceremonies for her son, Constantine.
The Robot Lady
At her first international competition in France, Stephenie experienced something unexpected. Walking into the venue on her bionic legs, she felt the eyes of every athlete in the room.
"It was like Monsters Inc., in the nicest possible way," she recalled. "These beautiful, talented, committed athletes all staring at me because I was a freak to them. I was super strange compared to a below-knee amputee or someone with a spinal cord injury. In walks the robot lady. They had never seen osseointegration and someone walking on bionic legs."
But what began as spectacle quickly became community. The acceptance was instant and genuine — a reminder that the para-sport world understands resilience in ways few others can.
Open Water, Too
Wheelchair fencing is not the only arena where Stephenie has channeled her recovery. She returned to open water swimming using specialized shin fins and a buoyancy belt, competing in the Murray Rose Malabar Magic event to raise funds for disabled youth swimming programs.
"With no feet I can't ride a bike yet and swimming was too hard," she noted, explaining why fencing became her primary sport. But the ocean, a lifelong love, was not something she was willing to surrender entirely.
Survival as a Platform
Stephenie's athletic journey is inseparable from her work as Co-Founder, CMO, and Global Ambassador of WanderSafe. The same determination that drives her across a fencing piste drives the company's mission to impact a billion lives.
"Not many people survive cerebral malaria," she said, "so I am on a mission to impact a billion lives."
Her story is not one of recovery despite adversity. It is one of expansion because of it — proof that when survival is no longer in question, the only remaining question is how much impact one life can have.
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