Megan King’s story is one of the few that best illustrates the revolutionary potential of contemporary medicine.
When Megan was sixteen and suffered a horrific injury while playing football, her life was irrevocably changed.
The 35-year-old woman from Illinois is discussing how she survived a horrific case of internal decapitation brought on by a rare illness and an odd accident.
Even while total decapitation is always fatal, internal decapitation—also known as atlanto-occipital dislocation in medical terminology—is a particularly dangerous injury in which the skull internally separates from the spine. It has a 70% fatality rate, according to Real Clear Science.
Megan’s nightmare began when she fell while trying to jump for the ball, tore muscles from both shoulder blades, and hurt her foot and back. Over the years, she underwent 22 surgeries, but doctors were unable to determine why her body was not healing.
In 2015, it was finally determined that she had hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos syndrome (hEDS), a rare hereditary condition that affects collagen synthesis and results in joint instability. Megan’s illness had the opposite impact, immobilizing her body, whereas some people with hEDS are incredibly flexible.
As her situation worsened, Megan underwent emergency neck surgery and was placed in a halo brace, a rigid device that screwed into her skull to hold her head in place. However, a doctor removed the brace too quickly, causing her skull to detach from her spine.
“I threw back my chair to avoid being beheaded by gravity,” she told The Daily Mail. My head had to be held in position by my neurosurgeon using his hands. I couldn’t stand it. My right side began to shake wildly. It was a scary show. When I woke up, I was completely immobile.
Following the internal decapitation, Megan had fifteen more surgeries. She can no longer tilt or move her head in any way since her entire spine—from skull to pelvis—is fused.
“I am a human statue,” she said. “My spine is immobile.” But that does not mean that I no longer exist.
Megan has been able to relive some of her past life despite the extreme physical limitations and the twenty years of recovery. She recently triumphantly returned to a bowling alley, which she hadn’t been since she was a teenager.
“I bowled a strike on my very first try,” she disclosed. “My friends screamed, clapped, and cheered wildly.” They weren’t only celebrating the strike. They were celebrating every one of my triumphs.
Megan is now focusing on getting used to her “new body” and constantly discovering what she is still capable of. “It’s not easy,” she admitted. “But I’m always in awe of what I can still accomplish.”
