‘Pins and needles left me paralysed and ready to die’

‘I wasn’t willing to say my goodbyes to my family. I just said, see you later,’ Luke Pickering recalls to Rebecca Whittaker

- Rebecca Whittaker

A father of two who assumed a tingling sensation in his hands was just pins and needles woke up paralysed a few days later – and couldn’t even close his eyes for weeks.

Luke Pickering, from Nottingham, went to work as normal when he first noticed the strange sensation in his hands. The next day, it had progressed to his toes, and despite trying to carry on as normal, the 31-year-old mechanic soon took a turn for the worse.

“I was carrying my eldest down the stairs and I just felt weak, and I thought I was going to drop him,” Mr Pickering told The Independent.

He insisted that he was still able to go to work, but his partner Alix, 31, realised he wasn’t well and took him to A&E, where he was diagnosed with Guillain-Barre Syndrome (GBS) – a rare condition where the immune system begins to attack the nervous system.

From that moment in November 2023, Mr Pickering did not return home for another 94 days.

“I thought I’d be coming back out soon, but as the weeks progressed, I just got weaker and weaker. I went from using crutches to being put into a full hoist. I couldn’t do anything for myself,” he said.