A white spot appeared and gradually became brighter. I focused all my attention on it and as I did I began to determine shapes and colours. Slowly, I could see that there were people standing over me. One of them, a man in his late fifties was making gestures with his hands. I focussed on him and realised that he wanted me to stand up.
Totally confused, I went to sit up and found that I could not move. I was having trouble coordinating my body. Nothing seemed to work properly. Horrified, I became conscious of the fact that I could not feel my body. I wanted to scream but my mouth didn’t work. I took in the view of the people standing around me and saw that their mouths were moving yet I could not hear anything. What has happened to me? Why can’t I control my own body? I thought.
The older man looked at me with a dissatisfied grimace and reached past me. I couldn’t turn my head to see what he was doing. I wanted to ask so many questions, yet at that point everything went black.
*
Again I saw the white spot beginning to light up my vision. I focussed on it with all my will. This time I was not going to lose it. As I concentrated I noticed that I could hear sounds. Voices. The white spot expanded and I saw colours and shapes, people all around me. I heard a voice with more clarity than I can ever remember. It was deep and had the sound of an old gramophone recording complete with the scratches and white noise.
As my vision cleared I could see the person speaking. It was the older man from before. He was saying, “Can you hear me?”
I tried to respond by saying, “Yes”, but nothing would come out of my mouth. It was like my throat had become a steel pipe. I couldn’t articulate my tongue or voicebox. I resorted to nodding my head. To my surprise it was extremely difficult to perform even that slight movement. Where am I? What’s going on?
The man said, “Rodney, I want you to try and stand up. Do you understand?”
Again, I could barely nod my head to indicate that I understood. I concentrated on contracting my stomach muscles and bringing myself into a sitting position. This only partly worked; leaving me stranded in a half sit-up position. I struggled to complete the movement and suddenly, as if some type of restraint had snapped, I was sitting bolt upright.
I looked down at my legs because I was still having difficulty feeling anything. They looked okay. Long, lean and well muscled. I heard the man speak again. He said, “Rodney, please stand up.”
Looking at the platform I was sitting on I realised it was some type of medical gurney. I went to swing my legs over the edge and again found that I had to use a significant amount of effort to perform the simplest of tasks. Why am I so weak? Why can’t I do even the simple tasks he’s asking of me?
“I was afraid this might happen”, the older man said. Now that I was sitting up I turned my head with great effort to the right and located him. I saw him reach behind me on the right side of my head and then everything went black.
