Woman left paralyzed after mistaking rare illness for just a common cold

A 29-year-old woman from Scotland was left paralyzed after mistakenly believing the rare illness attacking her body was just a cold.

Danielle McGuinness, of Glasgow, told The Evening Times Tuesday she had been experiencing what she described as “cold symptoms” through around Christmas and New Years.

“I had a really bad cough and I was throwing up but I was thinking, 'just keep going to work because you’re off for a month.’”

Yet just as she was about to board a plan on Jan. 8 for her four-week vacation to Cambodia and Vietnam, she began to lose feeling in her legs.

A doctor had told her it was most likely from anxiety about her trip, but McGuinness wasn’t convinced. She had her mom call an ambulance to a local hospital.

It was there that she was diagnosed with Guillain-Barré syndrome, a rare condition in which the immune system attacks the nerves.

The symptoms often begin as weakness or tingling in the feet and legs. Paralysis can occur with the disease, which, in the United States, affects fewer than 20,000 people each year.

Though doctors said its nearly impossible to determine what causes Guillain-Barré, they believe it was triggered by a virus she was battling over Christmas.

McGuinness said she has learned to walk without assistance and can nearly manage all of her care on her own, but the constant fatigue and relapses continue to affect her.

Yet through it all, she still has hope. McGuinness plans to write a book about her experience and eventually make her way to Southeast Asia.

“You never think these things are as serious as they are," she noted.

Source: nydailynews.com

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