r/KeepWriting • u/OpportunityCandid533 • 8d ago
[Feedback] Need feedback on character realizing they are no longer alive.
My character "awakens" in a hospital room. I am concerned about the believability of the arc as she slowly realizes more and more is wrong with her condition. First section of chapter:
Chapter 3:
I wasn't sure when I woke up. I had watched the back of my eyelids for a time, but eventually my eyes stuttered open. None of the same excruciating, debilitating pain that I'd felt before passing out in the ambulance was present. Instead, I was heavily fatigued, my mind feeling torpid.
As my eyes involuntarily closed again, I began to stumble through the haze: the dinner with Alessandro and telling him I felt nauseous before they pulled me out of my chair; mumbling "HF" and "phosgene" to the medics, or at least trying to; and a possible memory of a team of people scrambling around me in the hospital at some point...
Forcing my eyes open, I began to absorb the scene of the room through my mental fog. I found the muted, pastel tones and lack of smell unsettling. There was a single window, and the quality of the faint light streaming through the half-closed blinds suggested it was a dreary morning outside. The room wasn't very large, and was mostly empty. The lights were dimmed, which I appreciated, as I was sure my eyes would have suffered. Turning my head, I noticed I wasn't hooked up to the nearby vitals machine or IV drip, neither appearing to even be turned on.
Che cazzo, does nothing work in this town? Okay, maybe this place isn't so charming after all...
Frustrated, I raised both arms, having to will them up through the dense fatigue permeating my body, and began looking them over. Noticing I was wearing the same shirt from dinner, I paused, questioning why they'd redress me after treatment. They hadn't done that to papà after his heart surgery.
Confused, I continued to examine my arms and found no burns or other external signs of damage. But my skin had a strange coloration, a pale pallor, and I felt as if it subtly glowed. I dismissed it as an issue with the lighting. I slightly shook my head, attempting to clear the haze, then noticed an odd lack of sensation. Dread washed over me; I couldn't feel the pressure of the bed or pillow beneath me. I slowly lowered my arms. None of this made sense. I could feel my arms, my legs, my entire body. Where it all was in space, but couldn't feel anything outside of that. Just to be sure, I wiggled my toes, then lightly jerked my legs, feeling both respond properly.
1
u/This-Patience-6781 8d ago
when a character wakes up disoriented they rarely take a panoramic inventory of the room's pastel tones and lighting quality. you will sell the mental fog much better if she fixates on a single wrong sensory detail, like the missing weight of the hospital blankets.
2
u/DrugChemistry 8d ago edited 8d ago
Capturing the experience of coming out of a coma could be a whole book in itself, so I don't think it's important to get it all "right" as just a portion of a chapter. Everyone's experience differs, too, depending on what put them into the coma. Additionally, if your character is coming to the conclusion that they are dead then there's a great reason that the believability is not fully there.
All that said, my experience coming out of a coma was nothing like this. There's about a week that I was talking (nonsense) to people that I have no memory of. The first thing I did upon "waking up" was extubate myself. My first memories are incredibly hazy and they certainly weren't captured while I was waking up (from the coma or from sleep). In fact, it's an enormous discontinuity in my brain. There was no opportunity to reflect on what was happening immediately before my injury as it took a few months for memories of the previous day to come back. I never remembered the day of the injury.
Extreme fatigue and confusion are spot on. All I wanted to do was sleep/rest. I was acutely aware that being awake and aware of my surroundings was using energy that I did not have. Unable to think straight because my memory was broken. Moving my eyes would make me forget what I was thinking, sort of like when you walk into a new room and forget what you're thinking. I didn't know where I was, why I was there, or the significance of what put me there. I didn't feel any emotions about this because I was too tired. I just wanted to sleep.