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Julia Walsh described the successful speech therapy she received from Gary Wood as ‘a miracle’ |
Success of speech therapy says it all
‘Miracle’ treatment helped shocked mother who woke to discover she could no longer talk
CAN you imagine waking up one morning to find out that you can no longer speak? You can’t have a natter on the telephone, give your kids a rollicking or make small talk with the neighbours. That is exactly what happened to Julia Walsh who didn’t utter a word for five years following an aeroplane flight in 2002.
“It is weird looking back now,” said Mrs Walsh. “I thought it was part of the virus I had and that my voice would just return naturally the next day. But then it didn’t, it went on for weeks and months.”
After five years of being told that it was all in her head and being treated for depression, Mrs Walsh, 46, was referred to The Royal National Throat, Nose and Ear Hospital in Holborn where she received “miracle” treatment and can now hear the sound of her own voice once more.
“It is a miracle. I feel like I have woken up from a long sleep,” she said. “I have been given my life back after such a long and difficult time. As far as I’m concerned Harry Potter has nothing on Gary Wood [her language therapist]. What he has done for me is absolute magic. I only wish I had met him sooner.”
Her voice was massaged back to life after just one consultation with Mr Wood, principal speech and language therapist at the hospital. He performed a technique known as laryngeal manual therapy, which relaxes the muscles in the throat.
“Her throat muscles had become very tight, almost like having constant cramp, but within 20 minutes of meeting Julia she was making her first sounds in five years,” said Mr Wood.
“The therapy reset the muscles to their normal tone and posture, a bit like loosening the nuts and bolts in a car engine. You never appreciate your voice until it has gone – without it you lose your ability to interact with people and society.”
Describing the first words to her daughter, Mrs Walsh said it was the happiest moment in her life.
“It was so surreal,” she said. “She was asleep when we came back from hospital so I thought I would surprise her in the morning. I went into her room with a cup of tea and said ‘good morning’ and we both just burst into tears. She leapt out of bed and gave me a big hug and we just stood there crying. It was very emotional.”
After losing her voice, Mrs Walsh could no longer hold down her job as a restaurant manager in her home town of Torquay and she became deeply depressed.
Communicating with her family by writing became a huge strain and she couldn’t even take the dog for a walk.
“It was very frightening,” said Mrs Walsh. “I had always been such a lively and chatty person, but losing my voice was like having my life taken away – it was completely debilitating. I lost my identity. I stopped wanting to go out and I started to feel like I was just part of the furniture. I lost friends, my job and we nearly lost our house.”
Throughout her ordeal, Mrs Walsh tried nearly everything from psychiatry to hypnotherapy and acupuncture, but the whole time she was convinced that her problem was physical, not mental, as she had been told.
She added: “Everyone told me the problem stemmed from some life event and was rooted in my mind. I never believed them, but it is so scary that it took five years for me to be referred to the RNTNEH.
“If my story can help just one person ask for a second opinion then it will have been worth it. I’m sure there are people out there with the same thing.” |
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