Survivor of Flesh-Eating Bacteria That Took Her 4 Limbs Has New Mission: Helping Others Explore the Outdoors (Exclusive)

"We want to empower people to do this locally where they live," Aimee Copeland tells PEOPLE

In the 14 years since Aimee Copeland’s life changed forever after a rare necrotizing fasciitis infection required an amputation of each of her limbs, the now-36-year-old woman isn’t just surviving — she’s thriving.

When she was 24, Copeland, a Georgia native, contracted ferocious flesh-eating bacteria from a gash on her left leg after being plunged into the water during a zip-lining accident.

Doctors managed to save her life, but not before they amputated all four of her limbs: both arms below the elbow, her right leg below the knee and her left leg almost to her hip.

There were many long months as Copeland recovered, first in the hospital and then at the Shepherd Center for intensive inpatient rehab in Atlanta.

Looking around at the rehab center and noticing that everyone, including herself, was watching soap operas during the day, Copeland "could feel the impact that it was having on my psyche,” she tells PEOPLE in this week’s issue.

Related: Cases of Flesh-Eating Bacteria Are on the Rise as Summer Heats Up: Here's How to Stay Safe

"We can't just sit inside and watch daytime TV. This is terrible. I was like, 'We need to get outside,' " she recalls.

It was in that moment that Copeland — whose dreams of becoming a wilderness therapist had been derailed by her infection — found the motivation and the method to not only help herself but others.

A licensed clinical social worker, Copeland went on to get two master’s degrees related to psychology and therapy and founded a nonprofit, the Aimee Copeland Foundation, in 2017. She married the love of her life, Stephen Mercier, a fellow therapist, in 2021 and has never been happier.

Copeland was motivated to "bridge the gap between disabilities and nature because I started to see how disconnected and isolated people with disabilities are,” she says, “and the people who are most isolated from the nature are probably the ones that actually need it the most.”

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Trying to navigate a hike using her regular wheelchair on a trail in 2016, Copeland barely got a couple hundred yards and had to turn around because there was a huge rock. “The next day my wheelchair wouldn’t turn on because it had jiggled so much that the wires got loose. I basically lost my legs. I destroyed my wheelchair trying to be in nature,” she says.

Desperate to find a chair durable and advanced enough for the woods, she came across the Action Trackchair, "the ultimate all-terrain wheelchair," and took it for a spin in the Panola Mountain State Park in Stockbridge, Georgia, in 2019. “It was so exhilarating,” she says. “The deeper we got in, the smells, the way the light is shining through the leaves of the trees, it brought me back to all these memories of camping and backpacking, and was like this visceral, full-body relaxation, like I'm home. I was crying and laughing and everything in between.”

She knew right there in the woods that she wanted everyone with a disability to have that feeling — and was determined to make the $15,000 chair accessible to many. Launching All-Terrain Georgia through her foundation, Copeland raised roughly $200,000 and was able to purchase 10 chairs for others.

She didn’t stop there. Now with 22 chairs in over two-dozen parks, Copeland wants to bring the chairs to beaches, boat ramps and other outdoor attractions. Other states across the country have seen what she’s been able to accomplish — and are starting their own programs. “We want to empower people to do this locally where they live,” says Copeland. "We will give them our model.”

Friend Ben Oxley, who has cerebral palsy, relishes what he’s been able to accomplish with the chair that he got access to through Copeland’s nonprofit. “Every time I talk to Amy, she gives me motivation to push forward,” he says.

Related: Mom of 6-Year-Old Has Limbs Amputated After Eating Tilapia Contaminated with Flesh-Eating Bacteria

Alongside Mercier, whom she calls her “rock,” she moved from Atlanta to Asheville, North Carolina, in 2021, where Copeland opened up the Asheville Center for Inner Healing on 24 acres of land. She offers psychotherapy as well as nature trails, a salt pool, saunas and a hot tub.

“I’ve been on the other side of the couch and I’ve done the trauma processing, so I have that experience myself,” says Copeland. “And I get what it's like to have something taken away that you'll never get back. Most of my clients have had something taken away that they will never get back.”

When she’s not traveling, dancing, playing drums or swimming in her free time, Copeland is thinking ahead to what’s next.

“I have so much more to look forward to,” she says.

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