Patient perspective: Crystal wheeler
“I am Crystal Wheeler, a 33-year-old wife, mother, daughter, sister, and friend. Before November 9th, 2006, I had long hair, weighed 110 pounds and was teaching in the NYC public school system. On November 9th, 2006, without warning, I began having seizures. Little did I know I would be diagnosed with viral encephalitis and status epilepticus and thanks to my doctors and nurses, I am here to tell you that I survived.

I will try to explain how I got through the most awful time of my life. My mother will say that when I was admitted to the hospital, the doctors put me into an induced coma to stop the seizure activity. After 40 days, I was taken off my sedation and miraculously began following commands and woke up. During that time, my family went through torture, not only because it was it was the holiday season, but because I also had three young children. How do you explain to an 11, 5 and 6 year old what happened to their mother, or where she went? Here one day, gone the next? "It was very hard", says my husband. Though, with family and friends helping him through this, the children and he remained grounded.

After coming out of the coma, it was still a long road ahead. I developed a bed sore from lying in the bed for so long which turned into a stage IV infection; I had a blood clot in my arm from the intravenous lines and tubes. I had to learn to go to the bathroom on my own, talk, breathe, sit up and now walk with bent legs because of the contractures in my legs (which made my knees bend forward). It has not been an easy road at all, but each time I was hit with another blow, I came back swinging harder and harder. Most doctors gave up any change of recovery. They thought that even with the slim chance of survival, I would not be able to remember anything, spell or even be my former self in any way. However, a year later, I am happy to report that although I am at times forgetful, most of my memories have come back and most importantly - my life has been returning. I thank my neurointensivist for being the one doctor to not give up hope on me. If there is anyone reading this, I urge you not to give up hope either. No matter how bad it may seem, you must believe that there is always hope. Once considered the hopeless, I am now the hopeful.”