Shane Sumlin of Shreveport is, by all accounts, a true survivor. This local financial advisor, husband and father of two, describes his battle with a rare disease as an ordeal that became as much a mental affliction as a physical one. His long journey began in 2011, at the age of 41. It began on a late November day when Shane began to feel some weakness in his legs. “And literally when I woke up the next morning my antibodies had really damaged most of my peripheral nervous system.”
The doctors’ diagnosis came all-too-fast: Guillain-Barré Syndrome (GBS) – a rare neurological disease that causes the body to attack its own nervous system. Shane quickly became paralyzed from the neck down. “When my brain would tell me arm to move it just wouldn’t. So it was very, very rapid onset.” He would spend the next four and a half years relearning how to walk and use his hands.
Shane’s challenging recovery left him feeling isolated and hopeless. Thanks to the support of his family, friends and LSU Health Shreveport’s rehabilitation program, a full recovery, at sometimes glacial speed, became a reality. Shane went from full paralysis – a seemingly permanent state of being wheelchair-bound – to first craw, then walk and eventually even run, unaided. Shane described the process as endless and grueling. He began to recite one word to himself, again and again, a personal mantra he would fully embrace: patience. “And that is difficult when most of the world measures somebody getting better in weeks or in months and a year later and I’m still in a wheelchair and I’m not even near ready to walk.”
Shane now dedicates part of his time to the GBS | CIDP Foundation International, a global nonprofit organization supporting individuals and their families affected by GBS. “The number one thing that they need is hope. And so when I walk in and I tell them my story, but I walk into their hospital room, I tell them it can be done. Every case is different.” He’s even spearheaded a popular men's coffee chat program designed to create a space for men to talk through the emotional impact of their diagnosis.
