Tracy's story
My grandmother removed all the booties
Tracy Barrell grew up in the Sutherland Shire and moved to the Tweed in 2011.
A high achiever and a proud Bundarra woman, Tracy has ticked off a lot of things she was told she’d never do; getting married, having kids, and driving a car among them.
After discovering the school swimming pool Tracy ‘trained her arse off’ and got to represent Australia. She won gold at Barcelona. But not before she was identified as such a significant threat to the previous medal winner that she was ‘kidnapped’ and pressured to throw her races!
Tracy was awarded an OAM for her services to sport.
Living with a difference has been a lot about educating other people, about breaking down perceptions and stereotypes, and encouraging people to challenge their own assumptions. One of the hardest challenges Tracy has faced has been getting a job - ‘the stigma of visuals’, she calls it.
While Tracy’s family didn’t treat her as different, they did fight hard for her at times. They probably recognised - along with the crazy bull who got down on its knees to sniff her and the cranky sheep that let only her pat it - that Tracy had a special something.
Since moving to the Tweed, Tracy has been more employed than ever before and brings an all-important lived experience to the job. She loves what she does and continues to skate through life with grit, style, and a cracking sense of humour.
Tracy's interview
When Tracy was about 14 and hitting puberty she started to notice, more than she ever had before, that she was different. Tracy asked her parents if she could join a group - somewhere she could meet other kids like herself. This led to the swimming pool and eventually to Gold Medal performances in Barcelona.
Getting to the Paralympics presented its own challenges - not because of Tracy’s disability, but because she had to raise all the funds needed to get herself there. This included purchasing the official uniform (displayed here) and the cost of having it altered to fit. It wasn’t until the 2012 London Paralympics that athletes attending the games received funding parity with other Olympians.
An original Oze
From 1983 until 2005, Tracy used this original Oze deck skateboard to get around. It went with her to the Barcelona Paralympics. The decals have long worn off, as have autographs of the Tin Lids who signed it during a Paralympic fundraiser.
Tracy prefers to use a skateboard rather than a wheelchair to get around. It’s a lot more flexible and, when she needs to, she can tuck it up under her arm and still get around.
Tracy had a pair of special legs made for her wedding day, but wore them to her engagement party and “realised how large my arse looked, so I decided not to wear them to the wedding… I went with the no legs option, plus you know, everyone else was going to have legs!”