aul Wellman, a Bermudian with Lupus, has never played golf in his life, but it may soon be his favourite sport. Today, a group of about 40 golfers from Bermuda and overseas will tee off during the Bermuda Charity Golf Fest to raise money for the Bermuda Lupus Association and Lupus International.

Part of each $500 entry fee for the Fest will go to help Mr. Wellman with the long list of medications he has needed since falling desperately ill on March 4, 2005, his 38th birthday.

Mr. Wellman worked for Marine & Ports for 16 years until he was diagnosed with Lupus in the 1990s. In 2000 he had a stroke in his sleep that temporarily paralysed the left side of his body. Until becoming sick again in the spring of 2005 he was driving a taxi part-time.

His story sounds like one of those alien abductions in science fiction novels.

?One minute I was having a coughing fit at the doctor?s office, the next I woke up in a bed with a bright light over me,? Mr. Wellman told .

Unbeknownst to him, he?d been air ambulanced to Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.

For four long months he?d been in a coma battling pneumonia. He remembered none of it.

People with Lupus are more susceptible to illness because of a faulty immune system. Lupus is an autoimmune disease that causes the immune system to attack the body?s own tissue and organs, including the joints, kidneys, heart, lungs, brain, blood, or skin.

In March 2005, Mr. Wellman?s pneumonia was so bad that all of his organs began shutting down, only his heart was still functioning properly.

?The doctor showed me my son?s back and his whole back was white,? said Ralph Wellman, Paul Wellman?s father.

?In Bermuda, an intensive care unit nurse, Vanessa Carless, told me he was very critical.

?The doctors here didn?t think he would make it. Vanessa said if it were her brother she would get him help abroad.

?We had to force the issue, because the doctors here didn?t think he would make it. The doctors in Boston didn?t think he would survive either.?

Over the next couple of months various relatives and his girlfriend, Nitra Butterfield, took turns going up to Boston to be by Mr. Wellman?s side.

?It was very difficult to me,? said Miss Butterfield.

?We had been going together for a year. What really stands out in my mind is that the onset of this was on his birthday.

?We had planned a cake and so forth for him, but that is when he started getting sick. So he never got to eat the cake.

?All and all I tried to stand strong. It wasn?t easy, just like it wasn?t easy for his parents. Whatever it took to be there, we did it. Paul didn?t even know that we were there.?

Mr. Wellman was treated by increasing the strength of his medication on a regular basis.

?The last lot was the strongest they could ever use,? Ralph Wellman said. ?That is what slowly pulled him around.?

Mr. Wellman woke from his coma on June 20, not knowing where he was. He wanted to talk so badly that his father gave him paper and pencil to write what he was trying to say. Because he had a tracheotomy he could not speak.

?I didn?t know anything,? Paul Wellman said. ?I didn?t know my age. I knew my parents and that was about it. I knew my girlfriend, my son, my brother. But my father had to tell me things and keep repeating things so that I could remember.?

The first thing Mr. Wellman wanted was to call his girlfriend and his family. His father dialled the number for him and held the phone to his ear.

?When I got the call I was so excited to know he was alive and was going to make it,? said Miss Butterfield. ?Tears streamed down my face.?

Mr. Wellman?s memory gradually returned, and his body started to get stronger. During his long coma, Mr. Wellman?s muscles, particularly in his left arm, had locked up and atrophied. Mr. Wellman had also suffered loss of oxygen to his brain during his coma. He spent three months in the Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital in Massachusetts undergoing various types of physical therapy.

He finally returned home in September 2005 in a wheelchair. Miss Butterfield and his family and friends were waiting at the Airport for him along with all of his old taxi buddies.

Today, Mr. Wellman is now walking without a cane, and with only a trace of a limp. But he still only has minimal movement in his left hand and arm.

?When I came back I really had to visit Vanessa Carless, my ICU nurse,? said Mr. Wellman. ?When I came back in a wheelchair, she was very surprised to see me. If it wasn?t for her, I don?t know if I would be here.

?I would like to thank all those who prayed and sent cards and their kind thoughts during my illness. I would also like to thank all the doctors and nurses here and in Boston who made it possible for me to be here today.?

Mr. Wellman will probably have to take 25 pills a day for the rest of his life.

?I have a long list of medications,? he said. ?I take 15 in the morning and ten at night. So you can understand how high my medical bill would be. There is no guarantee that I will be able to work. They don?t know my long term prognosis. I go to therapy. When I came back to Bermuda on September 29, 2005. I could barely walk. I could do short distances. Now I am walking without anything. I am stubborn and I am going to fight.?

According to Margaret Wade of the Bermuda Lupus Association the group has had 40 members at its height. It was started in 1989 by Dessie Waldron.

?I was approached by the Department of Tourism because they were donating to the Lupus Association International,? said Mrs. Wade. ?There was no way they could have done for them knowing there was a similar local charity. I said we would accept the donation, but I said we hadn?t been an active charity within the last two years. We don?t have an official board, but we try to stay a support group. People with Lupus can call me and I can talk to them about whatever they are going through.?

Mrs. Wade, who works in the Post Office, has had Lupus for 16 years.

?They don?t know where it comes from,? she said. ?You just wake up with a stiffness and you feel like you have arthritis. Then you get a rash and swelling of the joints. It is ongoing.?

Mrs. Wade spent three months in the hospital undergoing an endless round of tests and observations, until she was finally diagnosed.

?Stress can bring it on,? she said. ?So now I try to eat a good diet and lead a less stressed life. I meditate on the Word. I have turned to my faith to help me. The biggest part of it is just staying focused.?

To contact the Lupus Association, telephone 799-1081. For more information about To A Tee golf events telephone 295-4640 of go to www.toateebermuda.com .