One year ago, tonight, there wasn’t a support person who could be present with me in the hospital. I was hallucinating from a bad response to the drugs and since no one could be with me, they chose to give me a high dose of sleeping meds — only the teams hadn’t talked to each other. My PTSD, mixed with the massive steroids they had me on for the swelling in my spine, caused a flood of cortisol in my system.

What that means is they had created a perfect concoction of meds to induce a full-scale panic attack — visions of dragons and hordes of armies tearing me apart, of being boiled alive and stranded in torment with my rapists, all locked inside my mind — while the sleep meds made me unable to move my body or scream, but I was awake. Very very awake. Alone. And terrified.

I’ll write more of it later, but when I was finally able to move my thumbs, I text Jen in Oregon. She and Keith called me and I could hear them as I desperately tried to respond in text — my fingers and eyes barely working.

These are some of the texts.

When I have the stamina to write more, I will share this adventure that changed my entire healing journey’s direction, and required support people across states to save me, ultimately bringing the hadn’t-slept-in-days badass, Leesha, back to my side, shouting my name and holding my face to bring me back to the world.

I have the most amazing friends. Family. Badasses.

Thank you, warriors.

I am taking a moment to honor the me then. I made it, and honestly, I didn’t think I would.

BeejHealth #SCI #SpinalCordInjury #TBI #PanicAttack #LockedInsideMyHeadAndBody #CouldntMoveOrSpeak #IMadeIt #WeMadeIt