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Terri has had a lifelong love affair with sports and physical challenges. She hikes, she plays basketball, she’s a nationally ranked tennis player; she also has a combination of rare spinal diseases, which have left her paralyzed from the chest down. “I’ve been in a wheelchair for 21 years,” she says, “but I just found different ways to do the things I love.” And it’s absolutely true what they say: you can’t keep an amazing woman down. Terri is also the world’s only wheelchair rappeller.

It all started with Terri volunteering as a Girl Scout leader for a high school–aged troop focused on adventure activities. With the help of a good friend (a climbing instructor), she and her husband took the girls to the highest climbing wall in the southeastern United States. Never one to shy away from a challenge, Terri learned to rappel right along with the girls.

“I always say there’s no stress when you’re rappelling,” Terri says. “Your job, your house, your kids — you can’t take any of that with you because you’re so completely focused on what you’re doing.”

“Rappelling is something you can do once, or once a week. I do it because it’s one more way to prove that nothing is going to hold me back.”

There’s no doubt: Terri is a real “rock” star.