At just 24 she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.
She made headlines in 2007 when she travelled overseas to receive radical stem cell therapy in search of a cure.
Some of the funds for the therapy were raised by the Riverina community.
More recently, she made headlines in the local papers after becoming stranded on the remote South Pacific island of Espiritu Santo in Vanuatu thanks to the twin disasters of Cyclone Harold and COVID-19.
Rather than lamenting her two and a half years of isolation from the world, Kat used her time on the island to finish writing her memoir Never Let a Good Disaster Go to Waste.
It’s now a best-seller on Amazon, and Kat is currently on a media tour of Canada to promote the book.
“The cover of the book is a picture of me standing in the middle of Cyclone Harold, shouting ‘bring it on’,” Kat said.
“It was exhilarating and scary at the same time. I mean, this was one of the most powerful cyclones ever recorded in the South Pacific.”
Surviving the cyclone, just like the many other disasters in her life, Kat credits her positive attitude and outlook to her 12 principles for becoming a “master of disaster”.
“I created them just 12 hours after my husband left me on my 40th birthday. At the time, I was a mum of three recovering from radical surgery to address some of the symptoms of my MS.
“I felt like my whole world had been shattered. But then I told myself that I needed to see the disaster in a different light, and so I flipped my perception around the situation.”
These 12 principles, loosely based on a combination of Buddhism, Stoicism and her unique life experiences, now form the basis for Kat’s memoir and have been instrumental in the Canadian-Australian finding courage and contentment within the chaos and ultimately triumphing over her tragedies.
“I battled for over a decade to find a cure for my MS. I thought I found it with the stem cell therapy, but I relapsed five years later and ended up having to take another experimental chemo drug, which nearly killed me.
“I went through hell and back, but by sticking to my 12 principles, I was able to shortcut my suffering, find the purpose in my pain and bounce back into happiness quicker.”
Despite doctors telling her she would most likely end up in a wheelchair by 40, Kat is now in long-term remission and has even reversed many of her previously debilitating symptoms.
She is a practising yoga instructor and regularly conducts health and wellness retreats in Vanuatu and Australia.
She has effectively cured herself of her ‘incurable’ disease - one of only a small group of people of the three million MS sufferers worldwide to have achieved this remarkable feat.
“We all have to deal with adversity in our lives, but it’s how we perceive and react to it that determines whether we continue to suffer needlessly. Every disaster, betrayal or loss can either be seen as a terrible tragedy or as a series of unfolding life lessons.
“And you can choose to radically accept this and find ways to be grateful for the lesson or the time spent together, or fight against it.
“Vanuatu is an excellent example of this concept. The people there are very stoic in their worldview.
“They practice radical acceptance, gratitude and forgiveness daily, even in the face of an endless array of natural disasters and loss.
“They are the very embodiment of the idea that to be happy, you simply have to be content with what you have.”
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