Woman who became mute finds out it was because she swallowed a coin 12 years ago

Writer Marie McCreadie has had an extraordinary life; she suddenly became mute when she was 13 years old.

Doctors had no explanation for why the Australian from Wollongong, Sydney, was struck without the ability to talk.

They thought it was a result of a former experience of bronchitis with laryngitis but when she recovered from the illnesses, her voice didn’t return.

She remained mute from the ages of 13 to 25.

One day, 12 years later, Marie started coughing and bleeding from her mouth.

On arrival at the hospital, the doctors removed a red lump covered with mucus and blood. When they rinsed it off, they found a threepence coin.

Marie, now 48, has written a book, Voiceless, detailing the journey of having to mime to communicate and then regaining her voice.

‘It was lodged in my throat for 12 years, from the ages of 13 to 25,’ she tells Metro.co.uk.

‘The doctors were all stumped; they had no explanation for my illness other than to “rinse with salt water”.

‘They carried out tests, bloods, x-ray, but nothing was discovered. Eventually, they just swept it under the carpet and told me to get on with life.

Marie explained that at the time, in 1984, her story received a lot of media coverage, with reporters speculating that it was a coin from a Christmas pudding – an old tradition to bring luck.

But that had little weight as Marie had become sick during Easter. Doctors theorised that it may have been a penny lost in a bottled or canned drink and swallowed without suspicion.

‘If it was in a cake, or similar food, you’d think that I would have crunched down on it,’ added Marie.

‘One day, 12 years later, I was at work when I started coughing and bleeding from the mouth. My work colleague called for an ambulance.

‘Doctors then found the threepence coin. I was upset because I didn’t know what was going on.

‘I had started making little noises, moaning, crying. It didn’t take me long to begin to talk again as I had been miming words all my life. In effect, I had been talking just with no sound was coming out.

‘The problem I had was with breathing, I had to learn to breathe properly to push the voice out.

‘After I was seen by an ENT (ear, nose and throat specialist) they made me rest for a week and then off to speech therapy.’

In the long years of her muteness, Marie became accustomed to a life of miming, signing and typing, the latter of which became her full-time job.

But it was a lonely time for Marie. She was told that the mystery condition was a result of God’s punishment and eventually left school after a suicide attempt.

After being admitted and released from a psychiatric hospital, Marie decided to get back into education, got her qualifications and landed a job as a typist with the Australian Public Service.

Voiceless, her book, is about this journey, starting with losing her voice and all the hurdles she overcame.

‘My journey has been long and eventful from extreme depression in the early days, to rising up and gaining the courage to find my place in the world,’ says Marie.

‘Although there have been bad times where I have felt completely alone and unloved. I have also had good times, meeting the right people and learning to manage my feeling and emotions.

‘For every bad incident, there were several good ones. I now have two girls and three grandchildren who are the most important things in my life. So somewhere along the line, I did something right.’

You can order Voiceless online.

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