Man Awakens 12 Years: ‘Ghost Boy’ Story Going Viral, Aware Of ‘Everything’ During ‘Vegetative State’? [VIDEO]

A man awakens, 12 years into a coma, and his story has reportedly been going viral this week. Martin Pistorius fell into a coma in the late 1980s. He was 12 years old when he entered into vegetative state for 12 years, reports Q13 Fox News.

The story of the man awakens, 12 years after coma began when doctors in South Africa checked on Pistorius and were left unsure as to what caused his illness. However, they already suspected that what he had was cryptococcal meningitis. Eventually, his condition grew worse and then he lost all ability to move and speak, and even make eye contact with his family.

Unbeknownst to the doctors that the man would awaken after 12 years, they told his parents, Rodney and Joan Pistorious, to just bring him home and let him die, adding that he was as good as a vegetable after that point.

However, he didn't die and "Martin just kept going, just kept going," said Joan, his mother.

His parents decided to continue spending their days with him, keeping up a routine, eventually leading to the man awakening 12 years into his coma, according to The Inquisitr.

Martin's father would wake up every morning around 5, dress Martin and take him to the care center. By the day's end, he would be given a bath, be fed dinner and put to bed. Every two hours, an alarm would go off and Martin's parents would turn his body so that he wouldn't get bed sores.

Before the man awakens, 12 years into the coma, this was their life.

Throughout that time, nobody thought Pistorious remembered anything, but he said he did remember, not only some of it but almost everything that they did and said.

After the man awakens, 12 years after the coma, he eventually wrote a book titled, "Ghost Boy: My Escape From A Life Locked Inside My Own Body."

Martin, now 39, detailed how everything that he remembers from the 12 years before waking up from the coma, saying that he thinks he started waking up about two years into it.

After the man awakens, 12 years since the coma, and told what he remembered, he said that when everyone around him thought he couldn't hear them and didn't know what was going on, they were mistaken.

At the time, he still couldn't open his eyes or communicate, but he could very well hear them talking to him. He could also hear the television already, and knew everything that was going on around him.

"Yes, I was there, not from the very beginning, but about two years into my vegetative state, I began to wake up. I was aware of everything, just like any normal person," Pistorius said during a candid interview with National Public Radio.

"Everyone was so used to me not being there that they didn't notice when I began to be present again. The stark reality hit me that I was going to spend the rest of my life like that - totally alone," he added, describing how he felt during that time that he was still in a coma.

During the interview, he opened up about the darkest time in his life and now living a life he never thought he would.

Before the man awakens, 12 years into his coma, he had been stuck in his body, feeling hopeless.

He said that it was especially bad when the care center would place them, the patients, in front of the television all day to "watch" Barney reruns, believing that he was a vegetable too.

"I cannot even express to you how much I hated Barney," he said.

One of the most painful moments before the man awakens, 12 years into the coma was when his own mom whispered to him "I hope you die" while he was still in the coma.

Today, Joan acknowledges that that was a horrible thing to say and Martin is also aware that she only wanted him to be in peace. She wasn't aware however that her son was already "present" during that time.

Eventually, the feeling of being trapped in his own body made Martin frustrated, helping him to start and take control of his life again. He reportedly learned to tell the time by the rising and setting of the sun.

"As time passed, I gradually learned to understand my mother's desperation. Every time she looked at me, she could see only a cruel parody of the once-healthy child she had loved so much," said Martin.

After the man awakens, 12 years into the coma, he said his family couldn't believe it that it took them a while to fully realize what was happening.

Today, Martin is already married, and has written a memoire about his life, according to Lifenews.com.

He can talk again, using a computer to speak. He is able to become mobile through a wheelchair, and his awareness has now fully returned.

"My mind was trapped inside a useless body, my arms and legs weren't mine to control and my voice was mute. I couldn't make a sign or sounds to let anyone know I'd become aware again. I was invisible-the ghost boy," he wrote in his book Ghost Boy.

To read more about Martin's book, click here.

The story of the man who awakens 12 years into his coma is proof that there is still little that we actually know about the human brain. This tale is also a perfect example why hope shouldn't be easily set aside, even upon hearing that "your loved one is a vegetable" from a medical professional.