On June 4, 2021, after suffering a series of mysterious and increasingly concerning medical episodes, Maddie Quillin had a massive seizure in her car on the side of Interstate 5, an experience she refers to as when she “died.”
Though she didn’t technically die that day, her word choice is understandable. Prolonged and severe seizures like she experienced can be fatal or cause permanent neurological damage, which she fortunately avoided. Exhaustive medical investigation led to a diagnosis of an extreme form of a rare, degenerative, hereditary disorder called Ehlers-Danlos syndrome. She was declared disabled, and had to leave her established career in the medical field and scrap plans to attend nursing…