”I lost my memory after surviving the London bombings”
Shanie Ryan, Capital Xtra DJ and QVC presenter, was caught up in one of London’s worst ever terrorist attacks 15 years ago – the 7/7 bombings, which killed 56 people and injured nearly 800. Shanie, who was 20 in July 2005, had been travelling to her dance graduation and in a split-second decision that was to potentially save her life, she got off the Underground train’s first carriage at King’s Cross to say goodbye to her flatmate, Leon, before jumping back into the second carriage.
One of the bombers stepped into that first carriage as she stepped off – and minutes later a bomb exploded.
“I thought there had been a terrible crash,” Shanie recalls. “I managed to escape from all the debris and get out of the Underground. I was met by medics who tried to put me in an ambulance, but all I wanted to do was escape so I did a runner. I’d perforated my eardrum and I had lung damage, but I just ran and ran to college.
“When I got there, everyone looked at me as if I’d crawled out of a war zone. I was covered head-to-toe in soot and I had charcoal in my eyes. It was then that someone broke the news that it was a terrorist attack. I was traumatised.”
Shanie eventually managed to get home and spent the next seven days glued to the TV screen.
“I was obsessed with watching the news to try to find out what had happened, to help clear my head, until my mum told me to stop because she could see it wasn’t doing me any good,” she says.
“In the weeks that followed, I tried to resume life as best as I could, but it was very much a blur.”
Soon afterwards, Shanie was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, but although she had therapy for a short time, it was too soon and she says it took her over a year to feel herself again.
PTSD Symptoms
Despite being determined to get on with rebuilding her life, Shanie started to notice some symptoms emerging that were different to the more common ones experienced by PTSD sufferers, which include feeling depressed and anxious in crowded spaces.
“I have always had a brilliant memory,” she explains. “As a child,
I was constantly learning scripts and my memory was a very strong muscle. But as time passed by after that awful day, I started to notice that I couldn’t remember things.
“It would be weird moments where, for example, someone would start talking about our school friends and I wouldn’t have a clue who they were, even though we had grown up together. No number of anecdotes could trigger my mind unless something silly like an outfit they always wore was pointed out, then I would slowly start to recall them. It often left me feeling overwhelmed, but for a long time I didn’t question it.”
The turning point came three years ago when a friend came up to Shanie and started recalling their college prom. “He started talking about something that happened that night. It was a big deal at the time, but I had
‘I could have died – I want to embrace life’
absolutely no clue what he was talking about,” she says. “he mentioned someone called Amelia and I replied, ‘Who the hell is Amelia?’ he looked at me as if I were crazy and said, ‘Please tell me you are kidding me – she was your flatmate for two years.’ even then, I still couldn’t remember who she was.
“eventually, after thinking I was crazy for not knowing, he reminded me she dated a man with a skinhead and it was only then that I started to remember her.
“But even though I did finally recall who Amelia was, I felt like I’d lost my mind. It felt so weird that somebody who had an excellent memory couldn’t remember someone they lived with. She’d been my last flatmate before Leon moved in, so it wasn’t ancient history.”
getting answers
Determined to get to the bottom of her memory loss, Shanie, who presents a podcast series called Influence Me, which tackles issues like mental health, body image and entrepreneurship, started listening to medical podcasts to try to find answers.
“One doctor explained a lot of important developments in a woman’s brain take place between the ages of 21 and 25 as the frontal lobe develops,” she says. “I discovered any impact on the brain’s development can manifest itself in different ways, including the loss of memory.
“While my brain had attempted to protect me from memories of the attack, it had also erased other memories in the process. It does not pick or choose which parts it protects.”
She says she felt relieved to have finally discovered why she was having difficulty remembering events, including her own
21st birthday party.
“Thank goodness I have photos,” she says. “If it weren’t for those, I wouldn’t be able to remember which bar I held the party in, what I wore or who attended it. What should be a momentous landmark is one
I now always forget. Likewise, if I haven’t met someone for a long time, I have difficulty in recalling who they are.”
Interestingly, only her long-term memory is affected. Shanie, who lives in Croydon with her fiancé Tony Sinclair and is expecting a baby in August, adds, “I’m a presenter for Capital Xtra and can remember my scripts word perfect. Luckily, Tony understands why I can’t remember some things.”
Time, and therapy, have been great healers for Shanie.
“I had to be in control and plan everything to the nth degree. If things didn’t go as planned it would throw me for the rest of the evening,” she explains. “My friends were getting more and more irritated that nothing was ever spontaneous, so six years ago I went to see a PTSD expert. The sessions help relax me and I’m a lot more chilled nowadays.”
Shanie hopes sharing her story will help others. “I could have been one of the 56 who died,” she says. “I don’t want my long-term memory loss to define me. I want to embrace life.”
Download Shanie’s Influence Me podcast or listen on Spotify
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