"Because He Cannot Cry"

This morning I read an article about a young man who was injured in an automobile accident when he was twenty years old. He has been immobilized for twenty-three years and, for twenty of those years, in what doctors thought was a "vegetative state. But doctors discovered three years ago that the man was actually conscious during those years, just unable to communicate that consciousness. What hell that must have been--to have your relatives visit and not be able to communicate your love for them; to have doctors diagnose your condition and not be able to refute them; to hear of a loved one's death and not be able to cry. And, of course, the story will make many people question the "vegetative" diagnosis of other paralyzed patients. However, a PET scan finally revealed that this man's brain was "almost normal," and doctors were finally able to make contact when the man was able to respond by slightly pressing a computer device with his foot.  When the patient later visited his father's grave, he closed his eyes for half an hour because he could not cry.   His physical condition may never improve, but his consciousness is no longer "locked in," unable to communciate.

While many of us have never experienced this kind of physical horror, we may have experienced that "locked-in" feeling when people on the outside label us and, through that labeling, think they understand us. (And people, like those doctors, who label us may also have the power to convince others of their "diagnosis." ) We may be unable to communicate our real feelings because that communication might have negative consequences on us or people we love. We remain stoic and silent for ethical reasons, because the situation that has created the "locked-in" feeling must be contained for the sake of others. Or  perhaps we just feel that to give way to our feelings would be to make us vulnerable in a way we are unable to face. How does one escape such a locked-in situation? Just as this young man did: with the help of someone who loves us or believes in us and with the help of people willing to listen to that person and to re-examine their own pre-conceived ideas. This man's mother continued to believe that her son was conscious, and she continued to press doctors to re-examine the diagnosis and to free her son.  Somehow she knew that her son was locked-in, fully aware but unable to communicate.

Most people can only hope for such a friend.