Emjaye Bowman is using music as her therapy as she battles through her life-changing diagnosis.
A woman who has suffered terrifying seizures and temporary paralysis since a fall in a darkly lit restaurant led to a life-changing brain injury is using music to raise awareness of “invisible disabilities,” after it eased her own symptoms.
After tripping and slamming her head into a metal DJ booth in the restaurant, causing her to black out during the 2006 drama, Emjaye Bowman, 33, of Central Birmingham, was rushed to the hospital and treated for a fractured face and bruising, before being sent home.
But, plagued by a throbbing pain in her head since the event, two years later in 2008 she was diagnosed with the functional neurological disorder (FND) and dissociative disorder (DD).
Emjaye, who is single, recalled her accident, saying: “One minute I was walking across the restaurant. The next I knew I had tripped over a box that shouldn’t have been in the middle of the floor and I blacked out.
“After the fall and the initial hospital treatment, I just tried to move forwards and carry on, but it was clear to me that something else was wrong other than fractured bones.
“I was blacking out constantly and even had seizures. I had no idea what was going on. I knew I had to get myself checked out again, so I ended up having plenty of observations and scans over the course of two years, which finally led to a horrific diagnosis.”
Discovering she had FMD – where mystery symptoms like headaches and blurred vision are caused by problems in the nervous system and DD, which causes seizures, paralysis and loss of sensation, resulting from a communication problem with the brain, according to the NHS – Emjaye was devastated.
Once forced to spend a whole week in hospitals throughout Birmingham, feeling completely ‘numb,’ as a result of her condition, Emjaye spent more and more time feeling “trapped” indoors due to fearing for her safety in public – until music became her salvation.
Now living with her friend and full-time carer, Lea Walton, 47, she said: “I have always loved music.”
She continued: “But I started using it as therapy by letting it connect to my thoughts and feelings around my condition.
“Somehow music has magically helped me. Whenever I’m listening to it or being creative, I have far fewer seizures. It allows me to express what I truly want to say about my condition. It’s been a healthy way for me to get used to my new life.”
Also a keen poet, Emjaye, whose health prevents her from working, finds writing verse a cathartic exercise – enabling her to express herself and talk about her condition.
“I love the impact poetry has when it comes to communicating how I feel, ” she said.
“Knowing how helpful poetry and music has been for me, I decided to branch out and invite other people with invisible disabilities like mine to join me.”
Late last year, Emjaye set up Warriors of The World – a self-funded group, inviting people with invisible disabilities like hers to come together for small music, poetry and performance events, which are based in Central Birmingham and can last for up to five hours – to raise awareness and provide a setting to meet people in similar situations.
Emjaye, who once worked as a senior performance administrator before her accident, said: “People who are blind, deaf, have chronic illnesses, mental illness, or other conditions we wouldn’t necessarily notice right away are the people I want to raise awareness for.
“People who show up don’t have to perform – it’s just a place for us to share our experiences in whatever way we are comfortable doing so.
“I want to break down barriers and challenge the stereotype of what people assume is a disability.”
Emjaye, also known by her persona Lady MJ on stage, recites poems about her health at events, which include lines like, ‘waiting for the lights to go out, feeling my last breath.’
“People constantly assume that because I’m young and look healthy, that I must have no complications,” said Emjaye, who hopes the performances will help people to understand what day-to-day life is like for someone like her
“While I have improved quite a bit since the accident, I’m still a work in progress and have a lot of complications I deal with.”
She added: “So many people walk around burdened by a secret condition that hardly anyone knows about. Now it’s time we made these illnesses more visible and spoke about them, so that we can get the awareness we deserve.
“I want everyone struggling with an invisible illness to find a release in music, like me, and to know that they’ve been heard and that someone sees them.”
Emjaye’s cause can be found at warriorsoftheworld.co.uk.
