The Fall: When the Whole Human Intelligence Responds

A true story of survival, ancestral resourcefulness and learning to trust the body

Executive summary

During a severe snowstorm in the French Pyrenees, my partner Gabrielle fell down the marble staircase of our medieval stone house. She was bleeding, disoriented and vomiting. The roads were impassable, the power lines from the valley were down, and we had no telephone or mobile phone. By candlelight, we had to respond to the person in front of us with the knowledge, attention and resources we had.

As we worked, we spoke about the generations who had lived in that house before us and how people once met injury without ambulances or modern emergency services. The experience did not make me distrust medicine. It showed me how body, attention, practical knowledge, relationship and spirit can work together when a crisis leaves no room for distance. Gabrielle survived. The event remains formative for me, and it informs the question at next week’s W.O.R.T.H.Y. roundtable: How do we learn to trust our body?

The fall

The crash sounded too large to be a fall. I heard it from the other end of the house and ran towards the staircase, briefly imagining an avalanche or some other disaster outside. At the bottom of the narrow marble stairwell, I found Gabrielle badly hurt. She had seen a scorpion on the stairs and gone to fetch a broom. At the tight turn, where the steps narrowed, she fell down the flight.

A vase had shattered. There was water, broken glass and blood. Her head had struck the marble; her face was swelling. She was cold, disoriented and vomiting. I feared that she might die.

My thoughts raced towards what might happen next. I felt fear and the wish for someone qualified to take over. Those responses were human and understandable. But the help I imagined was not available to us then. I had to bring my attention back to Gabrielle and to what I could see and hear.

A night without electricity or outside help

Our house was several centuries old and had been mostly in ruins when we found it. We had renovated it and added some modern conveniences. That night, heavy snow had cut us off. The roads were impassable, and the snowfall had brought down the power lines from the valley, leaving the whole village without electricity. We used candles. We had no telephone in the house and no mobile phones.

In normal conditions, an ambulance could take an hour and a half to reach us. In those conditions, the roads were blocked. We could not summon help and wait for it to arrive. I was not a doctor or a nurse. I could only pay attention, draw on what I knew, and respond to the next immediate need.

Gabrielle was shivering, so I went to the cellar for coats and covered her. When she tried to say “vomir,” I fetched a bowl. The candlelight hurt her eyes, so I moved the candle and worked in the shadows. She could not remain among the broken glass in the cold draught. I moved her clear of the debris onto a chair, supporting her as best I could. When she slumped forward, I used an apron to help keep her upright while I went for towels. I asked her to press them against the wounds on her head.

I knelt among the glass as I cleared a path. Shards cut my hands, and I left bloody prints on the walls and kitchen linen. Nothing around us was orderly or controlled. I had to keep noticing what needed attention.

Gabrielle managed one word: “Scorpions!” A little later, she said, “Cats!” I understood that the scorpion had frightened her as she leaned over the turn in the stairs. I went upstairs, gathered our cats and ushered them out through the shower-room cat flap, then returned to her.

I remember moving quickly, with adrenaline rising and my mouth tasting sour. I called Gabrielle’s name because I wanted to keep her engaged, though I did not know how much she could hear. In the dark, my voice became one way of staying connected when I could not find a safe place to touch her.

Then I realised the log stove had gone out. I moved her chair nearer the fire and opened the stove door. I reached for dry pine cones and added them to the fire. The flames caught, and the room began to warm.

The ancestors in the room with us

As the crisis unfolded, we spoke about the people who might have lived in that medieval house before us. Their world had no ambulances, radios or modern emergency services. When illness or injury came, people had to rely on family, neighbours, practical knowledge, local resources and whatever beliefs helped them endure. We could not know exactly how those earlier people would have responded. But thinking about their way of life helped us recognise the reality of our own: help from outside could not reach us, and we had to meet the situation together.

That comparison was not a rejection of modern medicine. I would have welcomed a doctor and an ambulance. It was a reminder that, before such help could be summoned or while it was out of reach, human beings had always needed to observe, improvise, care for one another and keep going. Their resourcefulness was not a theory. It belonged to everyday survival.

We had often talked about the stories people might have shared around a fire in that house. In the city, we rarely told one another stories in the same way. Living in the mountains gave us more time to listen and learn about each other. On that night, the thought of earlier generations and their lives became part of the conversation through which we steadied ourselves.

What our whole intelligence made possible

My mind still produced the words “Ambulance! Hospital! Helicopter!” I still wondered whether I was doing the right thing. Thinking was not the enemy; it helped me assess and decide. But repeated what-if questions could not attend to Gabrielle. I needed my attention, senses, practical knowledge, feelings and actions to work together. This is what I mean by the whole human intelligence responding.

I found towels and ice, made sweet tea with honey, and stayed beside Gabrielle. I spoke to her and asked questions to keep her engaged. When she was able, I sat close and breathed with her. She squeezed my hand. I kept adapting to what I could observe and to the responses she gave me.

I did not have certainty about the outcome or a special power to heal her. I had the ability to notice, remember, act, listen and remain in relationship. Trusting the body did not mean assuming that the body could manage every injury on its own. It meant staying present to the body in front of me—including its distress and its responses—and supporting it with the resources available.

At one point, as the swelling increased and I could no longer see Gabrielle’s eyes, I felt the pull of fear and helplessness again. I returned to my intention to stay with her and to help her through the next moment. For me, that intention became a practical source of steadiness. I cannot claim that it caused her recovery; I can say that it helped me continue to respond.

We decided together

At one point I said, “We must get the doctor!” Gabrielle answered, “No! No! We must deal with this together.” We faced the situation as it was and made a shared commitment to keep going. It could not guarantee the outcome, but it gave us something to do together.

As I made a path through the glass and blood so I could get her upstairs, I repeated my mantra: “There is nothing else left to do except breathe and be.” I stayed close, kept speaking with her and continued to respond to what was happening.

Gabrielle had known depression and a psychologically damaging marriage. I cannot say what determined her survival, and I would not reduce it to a single decision or a force of will. What I remember is that, in that moment, we met the crisis together. Gabrielle survived, and the experience gave me a lasting understanding of what it can mean to live fully: to keep participating in life, one moment at a time.

What this means for human practitioners

Emergency nurses, surgeons and other clinicians work for hours with people facing pain, danger and uncertainty. Their work calls on trained knowledge, careful observation, skilled hands, teamwork, judgment and compassion. These are profound human resources, developed through study and experience and brought to bear in real time.

Clinical expertise and the body’s own responses belong in the same picture. Skilled practitioners help assess what is happening, intervene where needed and support recovery. Trust in the body does not mean refusing medical care, assuming that every injury will heal without intervention, or replacing clinical judgment with instinct. It means recognising that care involves a whole human being: a body with signals and responses, a mind, relationships and a need for presence.

That night, professional help was unreachable, and I had to rely on my own attention and the resources Gabrielle and I could bring to the moment. It taught me that trust is not certainty. It is a willingness to stay present, notice what is happening and take part in the care that is needed.

The Fall remains one of the most formative experiences of my life. It showed me how resourceful human beings can be when circumstances call on us to respond together. It is a personal account of an emergency, not medical guidance or a recommendation to manage a serious injury without professional care.

A question for W.O.R.T.H.Y. Community

Every last Wednesday of the month, our W.O.R.T.H.Y. roundtable asks various questions such as: How do we learn to trust our body?

For me, that question began on a freezing night in a medieval house. We could not call for help or leave the village. We had to turn towards what was present: Gabrielle, one another, our bodies, our attention and the next thing that needed doing.