(Continued from page 4)

• 'My entire cortex - the part of the brain that controls thought and emotion and that in essence makes us human - had shut down,' he writes in his essay.
• 'Doctors determined that I had somehow contracted a very rare bacterial meningitis that mostly attacks newborns. E. coli bacteria had penetrated my cerebrospinal fluid and were eating my brain,' he added.
• He was placed on a ventilator at

the intensive care unit and for six days he was treated with triple antibiotics to fight the bacteria but his brain had little functionality and he was unresponsive, leaving doctors to believe he would not recover. 
• As his family prepared for the worst, on the seventh day he suddenly opened his eyes.
• His breathing tube was removed and he miraculously told doctors, 'Thank you.'
• He suffered from amnesia and could not remember his life at all prior to his illness and remained in a haze for the first few days after he came out of the coma.
• As he recovered though, he began to recall vivid memories of a magical mental experience during his time in the coma.
• There is no scientific explanation for the fact that while my body lay in coma, my

(Continued on page 6)