Five days before Shiff was to give an endowed lecture in New York, a neuroradiologist at the Toronto Western Hospital caused a cerebral spinal fluid leak. On November 7, 2017, this doctor aspirated a cyst in Melissa’s spine thought to be the cause of her persistent hip pain. That one needle inserted into her spinal canal changed her life forever. She was determined to give that endowed lecture, but on the flight to New York she could feel her brain rattling around in her skull. She was leaking spinal fluid, the fluid that floats our brain. Her symptoms are so severe that she can no longer work on her internationally acclaimed art. She has been bedridden, searching for answers for years. She has traveled to Duke University, The Mayo Clinic, Seattle and New York to find out why she could never heal from that first assault to her body. It turns out a cerebral spinal fluid leak is very dangerous to people with Connective Tissue disease, because it is extremely hard for the body to heal. Her body was altered by that doctor in the worst possible way. But, it is virtually impossible to sue a doctor in Canada, so Melissa has been given absolutely no compensation for Dr. Kieran Murphy’s botched job. 

 

    Due to the Connective Tissue Disease, on that fateful day Shiff’s cranium fell, her spine alone was not strong enough to hold up her skull. The corrective surgery was denied to her in Toronto so she had to travel to Long Island, New York to be assessed by neurosurgeon Dr. Paolo Bolognese. He recommended Cranial Spinal fusion. Connective Tissue Disease erodes the collagen in the body and, consequently, the most vulnerable ligaments that secure the cranium to the cervical spine can no longer do their job. Dr. Bolognese is one of three neurosurgeons in the western world who are qualified to diagnose and treat this rare condition. Shiff is now fused from her skull all the way down to T5 of the thoracic spine after 4 fusion surgeries. The first two fusions were not enough, so Shiff had to be fused again and again. She has been forced to seek medical help in the US because the Canadian health system has failed her. She has been bedridden, has intense headaches, disequilibrium, blurred vision, nerve pain, numbness in her limbs, brain fog and, at times, she could not walk to the bathroom unassisted. Plus, she suffers from other co-morbidites such as Stiff Persons Syndrome. 

 

    This project questions why Canada is failing to treat this population who have some of the lowest quality of life scores among the ill. The notorious case of Dr. Shamji plays a part in this story. In 2016, Shamji, a highly trained neurosurgeon, murdered his wife Elana Fric. Shamji is now in jail for life. His departure from the medical world has left those suffering from Connective Tissue Disease without medical care. He was the only neurosurgeon in Toronto who performed Spinal fusion for those suffering from Connective Tissue Disease. Canada has yet to replace Shamji and, as such, Canadians are forced to pay out of pocket for surgery in the US. There are other Canadians who desperately need to be assessed and diagnosed for Craniocervical Instability and related conditions. 

    M-Bedded is a story about the isolation of illness, survival, and striving for a diagnosis and a cure. We don’t know how this story will end. After four neurosurgeries, Melissa has regained some functionality, but not enough to return fully to art practice, nor to live without pain and suffering. All she knows is that if she doesn’t begin to have a purpose beyond staying alive for her son, she will likely die as the suffering is immeasurable. On the night before her first neurosurgery Melissa decided to leave her husband of seventeen years. Ironically, she was a woman who spent 95% of her time in bed but wasn’t having any sex, so she entered the online dating world, met some interested partners and invited them to her bed. The sex kept her alive and allowed her to experience her body in a pleasurable way for the first time since she was bedridden.