Turning From Victim to Victor After Being Electrocuted

By Gabriella Kelly-Davies, PNN Columnist

Kim Sullivan’s life changed irrevocably one Black Friday in 1998 when she was electrocuted in a swimming pool. At the time, Kim was enjoying life as a graphic designer and busy mum with two young daughters. They lived on a nine-acre property near the beach in Australia’s Far North Queensland, surrounded by lush tropical rainforest and fruit trees.

“My remote life was idyllic, the perfect place to bring up a growing family,” she recalls.

Kim and her family were staying with friends in Cairns, a city in Queensland, so they could buy groceries and run some errands. It rained overnight, and they woke to a stifling hot, sticky morning. Kim’s daughters asked her if they could swim, so she put on their floaties, and they headed to the kidney-shaped pool in the backyard.

The two girls swam at the front end of the pool near the steps, while Kim kept an eye on them from the edge, still in her white cotton pajamas. Her daughters asked her to turn on the spa jets, so she went down to the spot that housed the electrical switches and turned the dials.

Meanwhile, Kim’s daughters had jumped from the pool. As she joined them, they started screaming. Distraught, they kept falling over and trying to stand up. When Kim wrapped her arms around their little bodies to comfort them, she felt an electric current surge up her legs.

Kim fell to her knees, and then an invisible force catapulted her three meters into the air. She landed in the pool, dazed and barely conscious.

KIM SULLIVAN

Kim’s muscles froze and she struggled to move, but she somehow maneuvered herself to the edge of the pool, all the while screeching at her children to run inside the house. She tried to get out, but when she touched the pebblecrete, it buzzed with 240 volts of electricity.

“It was the most painful experience I ever encountered,” she recalls, “even worse than childbirth.”

Afterwards, blisters formed on Kim’s fingertips. They burned and stung. She had excruciating pain running up the insides of her arms and under her armpits, and a similar pain up the backs of her legs. Her neck and shoulders ached, and so did her lower back. She struggled with a constant headache that tormented her.

Exhausted and traumatized, Kim couldn’t touch a hot cup or put her hands in warm water. Doing up a zipper or buttons was impossible, and her constant flashbacks triggered panic attacks. Her terrifying nightmares disrupted her sleep, leaving her bone tired.

All too soon, Kim fell into a deep depression, and she struggled to look after her family because of crippling headaches, chronic back and neck pain, and debilitating attacks of shingles. She felt shattered with exhaustion every morning when she woke up.

Kim could no longer work as a graphic designer, and she was unable to do the things that previously gave her pleasure because of her chronic pain and fatigue. In the end, she had to rely on a government homecare service to clean her house, change the bedsheets and cook meals for her family. She felt guilty and ashamed about using a service designed for elderly people, and her confidence plummeted.

Learning How to Manage Pain

Kim spent years on the medical merry-go-round consulting rheumatologists, psychiatrists, neuropsychologists, naturopaths, physiotherapists, acupuncturists and massage therapists. But nothing eased her intractable pain or depression. Eventually, she took part in a multidisciplinary pain management program at a regional hospital.

“The defining moment for me was when my doctor explained how the electric shock had disrupted the way my brain cells communicated with my spinal cord and nerve endings. The electric current caused a malfunction in the way my nervous system processed pain signals. My doctor reassured me that my symptoms were normal responses to an electric shock and that I could learn techniques to reduce their impact on my life,” Kim explained.

During the pain management program, Kim started doing carefully graded exercise, gentle yoga and meditation, and she learned psychological techniques that changed the way she thought about and responded to her pain. She also learned to pace herself rather than her usual pattern of doing too much, triggering a flare-up and having to rest in bed for several days.

“I learned valuable techniques on how to manage my pain,” she said. “But it wasn’t easy. It took a lot of practice and patience to master such a different way of living with a disabling condition that had radically transformed my life.”

Once Kim understood why she was the way she was, she stopped feeling stigmatized by people she felt judged her. “Pain is invisible, and people think it’s all in your head. They think you’re a drug-seeker or a malingerer and hypochondriac. Some even claim you are just lazy and looking for attention,” Kim told me.

After the program, Kim focused on being as healthy as she could by carefully managing what she was doing and not overdoing things. Every day she goes for a long walk that energizes her, and she does a carefully graded exercise program with an exercise physiologist. She also meditates and does yoga.

“I still have bad days, but through it all, I feel more confident that I can self-manage my symptoms rather than spiraling back into dependency and brain fog. I was lucky to have an amazing support team. Through them I gradually realized that to turn from victim to victor, I needed to take control by self-managing my condition,” Kim said.

Kim is now an advocate for people living with chronic pain and eager to share what she’s learned.

“Self-management gives you the freedom to make your own choices and not rely on opioids or passive treatments by doctors and other health professionals. The benefits of passive treatments are usually short-lived, and they are expensive. They also disempower you. Self-managing your pain empowers you and boosts your confidence,” she said.

“By sharing my story, I hope I can help people like me who have tried everything, but nothing worked for them. I want to raise awareness of chronic pain and reduce its stigma and social isolation so that more people who live with pain can enjoy a better life.”

Gabriella Kelly-Davies lives with chronic migraine.  She recently authored “Breaking Through the Pain Barrier,” a biography of trailblazing Australian pain specialist Dr. Michael Cousins. Gabriella is President of Life Stories Australia Association and founder of Share your life story.