Facebook

Twitter

Friday, August 19, 2016

Celebrating Another Year of Consciousness

This is my brain on strokes.
Miracle Girl: Celebrating Another Year of Consciousness

Finally, Miracle Girl and Coma Chameleon blogs come together, as I begin a series of posts about covert cognition in celebration of my awakening, otherwise known as Coma Day.

As one of the few among the one in five vegetative patients with covert awareness to experience a full recovery, I feel a special obligation to speak out for those who cannot.


Posted by at
Labels: , , , , ,

3 comments:

  1. AnonymousAugust 4, 2026 at 7:28 PM


    Three friends asked me about preschools in Fairfax, VA this month. The difference showed up in a month. The right fit shows up in week one. Children can clean up after themselves. Most parents in Fairfax, VA end up at chantilly.

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousAugust 5, 2026 at 10:54 PM

    AA3B461F
    Van
    Erzurum
    Konya
    Giresun
    Tekirdağ
    Elazığ
    Zonguldak
    Niğde
    Tokat

    ReplyDelete
  3. AnonymousAugust 17, 2026 at 4:02 PM

    CEFA4A19
    Kastamonu
    Trabzon
    Burdur
    Bolu
    Kütahya
    Artvin
    Afyon
    Osmaniye
    Mardin

    ReplyDelete

Thank you for your comment!

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)

Contact me!

Name

Email *

Message *

Coma Girl

Coma Girl

Not a miracle recovery, but a miracle of modern medicine

In 2013 I fell into a six-week coma and nearly died after I contracted legionella. The Legionnaire's disease was in turn triggered by immunosuppression caused by the prednisone I was taking for my rare autoimmune disease, dermatomyositis.

I suffered a series of strokes on both sides of my brain when the sepsis caused my blood pressure to plummet. I fell into a deep coma. My kidneys and lungs began to fail, as my body was began dying one organ at a time. My doctors told my loved ones to give up hope for my full recovery. They expected me to die, and even if I somehow lived, I would remain a vegetable or at best left so hopelessly brain-damaged that I would never be same. But unbeknownst to them, while they were shining lights in my eyes and shaking their heads, I was telling them in my coma-dream--my secular version of a near-death experience--to leave me alone because I was trying to get back to sleep. I was experiencing what is known as covert cognition, the subject of my Skeptical Inquirer article "Covert Cognition: My So-Called Near-Death Experience," which appeared in their July/August issue.

But it wasn't a miracle--despite what so many continue to believe--that I recovered so fully. I owe my life not to God, but the miracles of modern medicine, as well as the nature of the watershed-area brain damage I suffered, as I detailed in my article and in this blog.