In 2006 at just 11 years old, Victoria Arlen lost the ability to eat, speak, walk, and move. Two rare conditions caused her to slip into a vegetative state. Doctors said that she would remain this way forever. Her family, however, never gave up, and neither did she. Four years later she woke up and came out of her coma. Since then she has not stopped shocking physicians all over the world with what she can achieve. This is her inspiring story.
The Inspiring Story of Victoria Arlen
Up until the age of 11, Victoria Arlen was a perfectly normal little girl. The only girl in a set of triplets and also with another older brother, she grew up playing lots of sports and being highly active. She loved to dance and was gifted athletically. Suddenly, after she turned 11, everything began to change.
First, she developed flu-like symptoms. This then turned into pneumonia. Soon after she began fainting frequently. She found herself frequently in her family doctor’s office. He attempted to treat her recurring illnesses and ear infections, but she kept having to come back. What no one realized is that she had two rare diseases that were slowly destroying her spine. (1)
Over the course of the year, she slowly began losing control of her feet, until eventually she could no longer get out of bed. This continued to then lose control of her fingers, then she began losing the ability to speak.

“It was as if someone was shutting off all the switches of my main control system,” she told VICE. (2)
No one understood what was happening to her. Finally, one day, Victoria slipped into a coma. The “switch” had been completely turned off.
The Coma
For two years, Victoria had no memory. During those two years, doctors worked continuously to try and figure out what had caused her coma. Finally, they discovered that she had an autoimmune condition called transverse myelitis (TM). This disease attacks the spinal cord and can cause paralysis to different extents. If there is no improvement within three to six months of the onset of the disease, complete recovery is unlikely.
The Initially Awakening
Victoria Arlen says that she “woke up” from her coma before she actually woke up from it fully. She regained consciousness, but she was unable to move or communicate with anyone. Victoria had no idea that two years had passed. She could hear everything that people were saying around her, but had no way of telling them that she was at least partially awake. The now 13-year-old tried to talk to them and couldn’t understand why they couldn’t hear her. It wasn’t until later that she realized that the words she thought she was saying out loud, she was only saying in her head.
Victoria soon realized that though she could see, she could only look in the direction that her head was pointing. She was completely unable to move her body, including her neck.

“I realized very quickly no one could hear me,” she said. “I realized, Something’s really wrong.”
Listening to everything happening around her, she slowly began piecing together what had happened. She overheard conversations in her hospital room that made her panic like you couldn’t imagine.