There's more to Fraser Brown than meets the eye.
He mostly wears his paralysed left arm in a sling and has done so for 26 years. What you can't see is Brown's other debilitating injury. For half his life he's lived in chronic pain — the type of pain that never sleeps.
Brown was seriously injured in 1997 when he lost control of his motorbike rounding a bend on Christchurch's Port Hills. He was thrown through the air and landed shoulder-first on the metal roadside barrier. The impact tore his brachial plexus — a network of nerve fibres — from his spinal cord, leaving his left arm paralysed. And Fraser facing a life of pain.
According to Brown, "brachial plexus neuropathic pain is described regularly as the most severe pain known".
Asked to describe the sensation he was experiencing while being filmed for Seven Sharp, Brown said it felt like his wrist was being crushed and his hand wrapped around a hot blade.
"There's a sense of the skin being torn away from the inside of the arm so it feels raw and exposed," he said, "and a feeling of a hot blade being pushed up through the elbow."
Prescribed morphine and codeine for pain relief after his accident, the then 22-year-old decided medication wasn't the best solution for him long-term, so he tried doing without.
'The pain hasn't won once'
"What has worked for me is a technique called mindfulness which is using perspective and attitude to cope with the pain."
An admirer of the stoicism meditations of Roman emperor, Marcus Aurelius, Brown uses the power of positive thinking to overcome pain.
"For the most part I consider myself one of the luckiest people alive," Brown said. "And I'm thankful for this experience."
Brown has his own scale of pain — usually rated as 10 being severe pain and zero being no pain — with his pain level surging anywhere from three to 12, and higher.
When his pain is at its peak, he struggles to stay upright or even talk but, throughout, he'll maintain his positive outlook.
"There are days when I may have 100 battles a day, but in those 100 battles, I have victories. I'm the winner here every time, the pain hasn't won once," he shared.
Brown has been sharing his experiences of living with pain on his podcast, Screaming in Silence and has been heartened by the response — receiving messages of support from fellow chronic pain sufferers around the world.
"People who have heard my story and my perspective on life have told me how they've been inspired by me, and I should share it with others."
Incredibly, Brown is back on two wheels, riding a modified Suzuki GSX-R1000, steering with his one good arm.
He said he had no fear of being back on a motorbike after such a serious fall.
"In fact, quite the opposite. It's my number one therapy... my happy place indeed."
Brown said he hasn't come across any other one-arm riders, though would like to.
"We could swap gloves. I've got a collection of left-hand gloves that I've not been able to use."
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