My "miraculous" recovery from a 6-week coma through a skeptical and humanist lens, written by a writer published by Skeptical Inquirer and Free Inquiry. When I awoke, I could barely raise my head, and it has been a hard road back. I also aim to educate the public about covert cognition. Too many people who are still conscious are being dismissed as hopeless vegetables, as I was. As many as one in five people with consciousness disorders have covert cognition. For them, there is still hope.
Wednesday, November 29, 2017
Not Seeing God: Patheos Nonreligious Bloggers Unite!
Miracle Girl: Not Seeing God: Patheos Nonreligious Bloggers Unite!
Not seeing is not believing. In "Not Seeing God: Atheism in the 21st Century," the voices of 24 Patheos Nonreligious bloggers come together in a chorus of godless dissent.
My chapter in this new Patheos Nonreligious anthology is a tongue-in-cheek guide to raising your secular children.
Wednesday, November 22, 2017
Weight: Giving Thanks for My Metabolism (Please Don't Hate Me)
Miracle Girl: Weight: Giving Thanks for My Metabolism (Please Don't Hate Me)
My weight has been feast or famine. But you probably won't empathize with me as visions of pounds gained dance in your head.
Maybe you can't be too rich. But take it from me, you can be too thin.
Monday, November 20, 2017
Christian Hypocrisy: Can the Unholy Still Be True Believers?
Miracle Girl: Christian Hypocrisy: Can the Unholy Still Be True Believers?
Hypocrisy, thy name is the Religious Right. But does being a hypocrite mean they don't really believe Christian doctrine?
To me, human nature says no.
And besides, the Ten Commandments doesn’t say anything about thy neighbor's teenage daughter.
Thursday, November 16, 2017
Roy Moore and My Molestations: When Political News is a Painful Trigger
Miracle Girl: Roy Moore and My Molestations: When Political News is a Painful Trigger
Many Alabama Republicans excuse Roy Moore's assaults. Will child molestation soon join the list of inexcusable behaviors normalized in the Trump era?
And what message would a Roy Moore victory send to victims of child sex abuse?
Friday, November 10, 2017
Democratic Wave: A Change is Gonna Come
Miracle Girl: Democratic Wave: A Change is Gonna Come
Seeds are being planted for Democratic grassroots. Finally.
Tuesday, November 7, 2017
Northam/Gillespie Race: Is Trumpism Coming to an Election Near You?
Miracle Girl: Northam/Gillespie Race: Is Trumpism Coming to an Election Near You?
Trumpian racial fear mongering in the Northam/Gillespie gubernatorial contest shows that Virginia isn't just for lovers. It's for haters, too.
If Ed Gillespie wins, so does Trumpism.
Friday, November 3, 2017
Aggressively Affectionate Cats: Pawed and Dangerous
Miracle Girl: Aggressively Affectionate Cats: Pawed and Dangerous
How can defenseless humans combat aggressive, but affectionate, cats armed -- and pawed -- with ice picks and sabers?
With only with a spray bottle to defend us, we battle our feline overlord.
Labels:
cat aggression,
cats,
Hitch,
Miracle Girl,
Nala,
Squirmy
Wednesday, November 1, 2017
My Political Predictions: Through a Glass Dimly
Miracle Girl: My Political Predictions: Through a Glass Dimly
Will favorable political predictions for 2018 and 2020 wind up in the same graveyard as Hillary Clinton's landslide victory?
You would think I'd get out of the prediction business after the 2016 debacle....
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Coma Girl

About Me
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.