Paralysis
When Dana went to bed, Greg was fine. He’d fallen asleep in front of the television, as usual. Almost every night he did that. They’d watch something entertaining – a bunch of sociopaths put on an island together and made to compete and conspire against each other, a drama about a gruesome murder or horrifying sex crime, or a sitcom about a group of people who were so dysfunctional and unable to cope that their distress was hilarious – and then switch over to a 24 hour news channel.
This broadcast generally consisted of the same ten minutes of news, repeated three or four times an hour and interspersed with intermittent repeats of the weather forecast, a replay of pre-packaged interview or side story to break it up. It was easy to fall asleep to it, and Greg did just that every night.
Dana turned down the volume and switched off the light to leave Greg bathed in the white blue flickering glow of the TV screen, casting one last look at him as she headed upstairs. His hands were crossed on his lap, his head was back and his mouth open, and his left shoulder had dropped a bit, as usual. He looked terribly uncomfortable, but his face was peaceful. He was fine.
When she got up in the morning and went down to wake him, she found Greg in the same position. Exactly the same position: head back, mouth open, left shoulder down and hands still crossed in his lap. The only difference was that now his eyes were open, and his pupils were wide with alarm.
‘What are you doing sweetie,’ she asked as she walked towards him. He didn’t move a muscle. ‘Sweetie?’
Maybe he’d fallen asleep with his eyes open? She gave him a playful shake, and to her dismay he simply tipped over without losing his shape, as though he were a mannequin bent into that figure.‘Sweetie?’ The tone of mild concern had escalated to one of high anxiety by now, and as she spoke Dana shook Greg hard. There was no response at all, and she knew without thinking about it that he was not messing around, but she had no idea what was actually going on. It scared her.
She knelt down on the rug and looked at his face, comically sideways on the couch where she’d tipped him over. His eyes were still wide, and his sitting pose had not changed, although his mouth had now closed, pushed shut by the falling action. He was still warm and breathing, but he was not responding in any other way. With some effort she tilted him up to a sitting position again, and his rigidity helped in this. She slapped his face lightly, as if to bring him out of a swoon, and gently called to him. ‘Greg. Greg. Greg honey. Wake up, sweetie.’ Not even a twitch, although once or twice those terrified eyes did blink.
‘Blink if you can understand me,’ she said, but those same bastard eyes refused to do so. She sat on the couch and rolled him over so his head was in her lap, and for a little while she cradled him and stroked his hair, and rocked gently back and forth. She disentwined his hands and laid them by his sides, which took a bit of effort, and still he did not move. Panicking but keeping a lid on it as much as she could for his sake, she called an ambulance and raced upstairs to change while it was on the way.
The paramedics lifted Greg off the couch, straightened out his stiffened arms, legs and back, laid him on a stretcher, and prepared to take him away. No, they hadn’t seen anything like this before, they admitted.
The doctors were the same. A very unusual, one might almost say unique, case. A flurry of examinations, a battery of tests and an expense of consultations revealed nothing. There was no discernible physical reason for Greg’s global immobility. His muscles were in fine shape, his spine strong and straight, and his brain, well that showed perfectly normal activity. In fact, they wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if Greg was fully aware of what was going on around him, only he was unable to provide even the slightest flicker of acknowledgement that this was the case. Indeed, that would more than likely account for the haunting look in his eyes. Among themselves, the doctors marvelled at just how much dread and distress could be so generously conveyed through just the eyeballs themselves. Remarkable really.
The medicos had, as it turned out, hit the nail pretty squarely on the head in at least one respect. Greg had been watching everything that had been happening to him ever since he’d woken up to his paralysis, and from the very start had been mentally straining, ordering his muscles to move in various ways without any success, and despairing at their unwillingness to do so. The scene with Dana had been particularly excruciating. There was nothing – literally nothing more in the world – that he had wanted more than to put his arms around her and tell her he was fine. Her alarm had been awful and contagious, and when he couldn’t do anything to allay her worsening anxiety – not even blink at the right time – it had grieved as well as frightened him.
The business with the paramedics and the doctors had driven him further into shock and disbelief, as the depressing conviction that he might be like this forever had begun to grow on him like a cancer. But trying to move became tiring, and there was, he had to admit, a certain gratifying aspect to being the centre of attention and the focus of such empathetic consternation. The idea that, for a while at least, people would have to do things for him, lent some comfort to an otherwise upsetting situation.
As the hours, and then days went on, he became more used to the notion that his mind, as lively and agile as ever, was trapped in a recalcitrant body, and there was nothing he or anyone else could do about it. It gave him plenty of time to contemplate life’s many mysteries, to dwell on merry memories and rake over past injustices, and for most of the time he was left in peace. That was nice. Not having to go anywhere, or do anything, not having to fake smiles or tolerate twats, to have no pain, no distractions, no difficulties or disturbances, gave him a sense of freedom he’d never experienced before. He could send his mind anywhere in the world, on his own schedule and on any whim, without seeking permission or provoking consequences.
The only annoying thing was visitors. At first it wasn’t so bad, because no one knew how long it would last or how much he was receiving in a physical sense, so his visitors were very careful and loving around him. They whispered in the corner together, and when they spoke to him they stroked his hand and their tone was affectionate and encouraging. But as time went on the people that did keep on coming to visit him became less and less aware of his presence, and then began to act as if he wasn’t even there. Or worse, spoke about him as if he was just a lump of meat.
‘Why doesn’t he just die?’ asked his sister one day. Her social schedule had been greatly disrupted by this imposition.
‘If we could just pull a plug somewhere,’ said his brother.
‘We can’t just let him starve to death...can we?’ said his other sister. The nice one.
The exception was Dana. She never changed her tone, never asked brutal questions or made chilling suggestions; she just remained loving, caring, and wonderfully present. When she was there he felt better, and when he thought about their lives together he was brilliantly happy. He couldn’t see what this was doing to her.
The situation couldn’t be sustained, though, the doctors explained. His usefulness as an object of curiosity was at an end. Physiologists, neurologists, psychologists, orthopaedic specialists, urologists, aetiologists, phlebotomists, oncologists, cardiologists, radiologists and pathologists had all had a crack at deciphering his condition, but none had come close. The cause of his malady was beyond medical science, and the doctors didn’t need Greg hanging around to remind him of their limitations.
Besides, hospitals are for sick people, and Greg...unfortunately he was a well person who just couldn’t move. The best they could offer was to move him to a hospice. The good folks there would continue to provide him with the nutrients he needed, and deal with the byproducts of the bodily functions unaffected by this odd panplegia.
So Greg was bundled up and shipped off to a hospice – actually a geriatric facility which, all agreed, was best equipped to take care of him. At first the staff just left him lying in his room, and that was terrific. Most of the time he was just a beautiful blank. Nothing troubled him, nothing excited him, and nothing and no one bothered him. Dana popped by occasionally to stroke his cheek (he could see it happening but couldn’t feel it) and to softly cry over him. He was touched by her devotion, but not so much that he counted on her attendance. He had his memories, and that was all he needed. He didn’t even notice that her visits were becoming less and less frequent, and of shorter and shorter duration.
His family still came by every now and then, too – generally to defame and disparage him, or to wish him dead. He didn’t take it personally; he must have been costing them a fortune.
The end came when a new ward sister came over. God, she was bright and breezy, and assuredly no fan of inactivity. For a while she concentrated on getting the more mobile of her senescent charges moving more often and more vigorously, but once they had all been forced into grumbling action, she started targeting the more morbid inmates. Inevitably, she worked her way around to Greg. She had decided, she told the orderly that accompanied her, that Greg needed stimulation. So, every morning he was to be folded into a wheelchair and wheeled out into the sunroom where, for his edification and entertainment he would be propped in front of the television. He would be returned to his room no earlier than 4pm.
The next morning a couple of orderlies used a hoist and a lot of grunting to manhandle Greg into a chair and pushed him into the sun room, where he joined a semi-circle of similarly disposed individuals, and left facing the television.
The 24 hour news station was on, as always. As the third iteration of the same six news stories began its cycle, Greg got up from his chair and walked unsteadily out of there.
This broadcast generally consisted of the same ten minutes of news, repeated three or four times an hour and interspersed with intermittent repeats of the weather forecast, a replay of pre-packaged interview or side story to break it up. It was easy to fall asleep to it, and Greg did just that every night.
Dana turned down the volume and switched off the light to leave Greg bathed in the white blue flickering glow of the TV screen, casting one last look at him as she headed upstairs. His hands were crossed on his lap, his head was back and his mouth open, and his left shoulder had dropped a bit, as usual. He looked terribly uncomfortable, but his face was peaceful. He was fine.
When she got up in the morning and went down to wake him, she found Greg in the same position. Exactly the same position: head back, mouth open, left shoulder down and hands still crossed in his lap. The only difference was that now his eyes were open, and his pupils were wide with alarm.
‘What are you doing sweetie,’ she asked as she walked towards him. He didn’t move a muscle. ‘Sweetie?’
Maybe he’d fallen asleep with his eyes open? She gave him a playful shake, and to her dismay he simply tipped over without losing his shape, as though he were a mannequin bent into that figure.‘Sweetie?’ The tone of mild concern had escalated to one of high anxiety by now, and as she spoke Dana shook Greg hard. There was no response at all, and she knew without thinking about it that he was not messing around, but she had no idea what was actually going on. It scared her.
She knelt down on the rug and looked at his face, comically sideways on the couch where she’d tipped him over. His eyes were still wide, and his sitting pose had not changed, although his mouth had now closed, pushed shut by the falling action. He was still warm and breathing, but he was not responding in any other way. With some effort she tilted him up to a sitting position again, and his rigidity helped in this. She slapped his face lightly, as if to bring him out of a swoon, and gently called to him. ‘Greg. Greg. Greg honey. Wake up, sweetie.’ Not even a twitch, although once or twice those terrified eyes did blink.
‘Blink if you can understand me,’ she said, but those same bastard eyes refused to do so. She sat on the couch and rolled him over so his head was in her lap, and for a little while she cradled him and stroked his hair, and rocked gently back and forth. She disentwined his hands and laid them by his sides, which took a bit of effort, and still he did not move. Panicking but keeping a lid on it as much as she could for his sake, she called an ambulance and raced upstairs to change while it was on the way.
The paramedics lifted Greg off the couch, straightened out his stiffened arms, legs and back, laid him on a stretcher, and prepared to take him away. No, they hadn’t seen anything like this before, they admitted.
The doctors were the same. A very unusual, one might almost say unique, case. A flurry of examinations, a battery of tests and an expense of consultations revealed nothing. There was no discernible physical reason for Greg’s global immobility. His muscles were in fine shape, his spine strong and straight, and his brain, well that showed perfectly normal activity. In fact, they wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if Greg was fully aware of what was going on around him, only he was unable to provide even the slightest flicker of acknowledgement that this was the case. Indeed, that would more than likely account for the haunting look in his eyes. Among themselves, the doctors marvelled at just how much dread and distress could be so generously conveyed through just the eyeballs themselves. Remarkable really.
The medicos had, as it turned out, hit the nail pretty squarely on the head in at least one respect. Greg had been watching everything that had been happening to him ever since he’d woken up to his paralysis, and from the very start had been mentally straining, ordering his muscles to move in various ways without any success, and despairing at their unwillingness to do so. The scene with Dana had been particularly excruciating. There was nothing – literally nothing more in the world – that he had wanted more than to put his arms around her and tell her he was fine. Her alarm had been awful and contagious, and when he couldn’t do anything to allay her worsening anxiety – not even blink at the right time – it had grieved as well as frightened him.
The business with the paramedics and the doctors had driven him further into shock and disbelief, as the depressing conviction that he might be like this forever had begun to grow on him like a cancer. But trying to move became tiring, and there was, he had to admit, a certain gratifying aspect to being the centre of attention and the focus of such empathetic consternation. The idea that, for a while at least, people would have to do things for him, lent some comfort to an otherwise upsetting situation.
As the hours, and then days went on, he became more used to the notion that his mind, as lively and agile as ever, was trapped in a recalcitrant body, and there was nothing he or anyone else could do about it. It gave him plenty of time to contemplate life’s many mysteries, to dwell on merry memories and rake over past injustices, and for most of the time he was left in peace. That was nice. Not having to go anywhere, or do anything, not having to fake smiles or tolerate twats, to have no pain, no distractions, no difficulties or disturbances, gave him a sense of freedom he’d never experienced before. He could send his mind anywhere in the world, on his own schedule and on any whim, without seeking permission or provoking consequences.
The only annoying thing was visitors. At first it wasn’t so bad, because no one knew how long it would last or how much he was receiving in a physical sense, so his visitors were very careful and loving around him. They whispered in the corner together, and when they spoke to him they stroked his hand and their tone was affectionate and encouraging. But as time went on the people that did keep on coming to visit him became less and less aware of his presence, and then began to act as if he wasn’t even there. Or worse, spoke about him as if he was just a lump of meat.
‘Why doesn’t he just die?’ asked his sister one day. Her social schedule had been greatly disrupted by this imposition.
‘If we could just pull a plug somewhere,’ said his brother.
‘We can’t just let him starve to death...can we?’ said his other sister. The nice one.
The exception was Dana. She never changed her tone, never asked brutal questions or made chilling suggestions; she just remained loving, caring, and wonderfully present. When she was there he felt better, and when he thought about their lives together he was brilliantly happy. He couldn’t see what this was doing to her.
The situation couldn’t be sustained, though, the doctors explained. His usefulness as an object of curiosity was at an end. Physiologists, neurologists, psychologists, orthopaedic specialists, urologists, aetiologists, phlebotomists, oncologists, cardiologists, radiologists and pathologists had all had a crack at deciphering his condition, but none had come close. The cause of his malady was beyond medical science, and the doctors didn’t need Greg hanging around to remind him of their limitations.
Besides, hospitals are for sick people, and Greg...unfortunately he was a well person who just couldn’t move. The best they could offer was to move him to a hospice. The good folks there would continue to provide him with the nutrients he needed, and deal with the byproducts of the bodily functions unaffected by this odd panplegia.
So Greg was bundled up and shipped off to a hospice – actually a geriatric facility which, all agreed, was best equipped to take care of him. At first the staff just left him lying in his room, and that was terrific. Most of the time he was just a beautiful blank. Nothing troubled him, nothing excited him, and nothing and no one bothered him. Dana popped by occasionally to stroke his cheek (he could see it happening but couldn’t feel it) and to softly cry over him. He was touched by her devotion, but not so much that he counted on her attendance. He had his memories, and that was all he needed. He didn’t even notice that her visits were becoming less and less frequent, and of shorter and shorter duration.
His family still came by every now and then, too – generally to defame and disparage him, or to wish him dead. He didn’t take it personally; he must have been costing them a fortune.
The end came when a new ward sister came over. God, she was bright and breezy, and assuredly no fan of inactivity. For a while she concentrated on getting the more mobile of her senescent charges moving more often and more vigorously, but once they had all been forced into grumbling action, she started targeting the more morbid inmates. Inevitably, she worked her way around to Greg. She had decided, she told the orderly that accompanied her, that Greg needed stimulation. So, every morning he was to be folded into a wheelchair and wheeled out into the sunroom where, for his edification and entertainment he would be propped in front of the television. He would be returned to his room no earlier than 4pm.
The next morning a couple of orderlies used a hoist and a lot of grunting to manhandle Greg into a chair and pushed him into the sun room, where he joined a semi-circle of similarly disposed individuals, and left facing the television.
The 24 hour news station was on, as always. As the third iteration of the same six news stories began its cycle, Greg got up from his chair and walked unsteadily out of there.