Holly first let us feature her in 2016. Here is a link to the original article-
http://thegimpygirlwhocould.blogspot.com/2016/05/day-22-faces-of-guillain-barre-story.html?m=1
Thank you Holly for updating your story and letting us share it again.
In 2011, life was great, and I was very healthy. I had just given birth to my daughter Casey, three weeks earlier when I was suddenly diagnosed with GBS, a disease I had never even heard of before. I was only 26 years old.
It started out as a tingle in my finger, a bit of weakness in my legs, and just twenty-four hours later I could barely walk anymore. I went to the ER, where I was diagnosed (quickly, thankfully) and admitted into the hospital. I was told that they would need to monitor me to see how bad things got. Unfortunately, the paralysis spread very fast, and within seventy-two hours I was breathing on a ventilator in ICU. I showed no signs of improvement for over six weeks.
Although I was told that with GBS you will get better, I was convinced that I’d be in a vegetative state for the rest of my life. I didn’t believe that I was going to get better and get out of the hospital. I didn’t believe I was going to ever be a real mother to my newborn baby, and I became very hopeless and depressed.
I spent almost three months in ICU paralyzed from the neck down. It was a very dark time - full of pain, tears, anxiety and depression. But when I started moving again, and when I started to see myself recovering, it ignited a flame in me to push myself to get back to my life and back to my baby. After ten weeks in physiotherapy where I learned how to walk again, and after a hundred and twenty-six days total in the hospital, I finally returned home .
After I was home and had completed my physiotherapy, I knew if I wanted to get any stronger than I was, I would need to put in a ton of work. My recovery was my responsibility; no one else’s. I was not going to get stronger if I sat around on my couch. I started going for walks every day, slowly strengthening my legs more and more over time. Then I moved on to a gentle yoga. Seeing myself improve as the weeks went by, once again showed me that I was capable of so much more than I initially thought I was. After that, I started running. Many times I would have to stop from the pain and take a break for a few days, but then I would try again. And over time, I got stronger and faster. Next I tried the at home workout Insanity, which again, over time, I grew stronger and stronger. And that’s what I continued to do. Eventually I made my way into a gym and started weight training. Now, 7 years later, I am stronger than I ever was before GBS.
Not only did I have an incredible recovery, getting GBS changed my entire outlook on life. I now see my experience as a blessing, as it made me appreciate all the things that I could do again, and it reminded me to live my life it to the absolute fullest. When I had been at my worst, I thought I was never going to recover, and here I am now.
I started volunteering with the GBS Foundation of Canada, to help others going through this disease - to show them that you can recover. I also wrote a book about my journey and made a YouTube video to inspire others not to give up.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=huN8iIWXNCs
I have learned that life doesn’t usually go the we planned it; life is full of challenges and bumps along the road. But choosing the see the blessings, choosing to be positive and make the best of any situation, really does make all the difference in the world.
To learn more about Holly, visit her website at www.hollyaftergbs.com
