Ella's life changed in 15 minutes. The next 8 years were spent trapped in a bed she couldn't leave.

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As a teenager, Ella Engel had grand plans for her life. A gap year in Europe. A degree in health science. An internship abroad.

Instead, Ella's youth was stolen from her by an illness with no cure. For eight long years, she was bedbound, unable to sit upright or even leave her bedroom.

At her worst, Ella lived in a semi-comatose state. She was nonverbal and paralysed, and due to swelling on her brain, she couldn't even be spoken to.

Watch: Ella stands for the first time in years. Post continues below.

For 14 years, Ella was the quintessential Sydney Northern Beaches kid — a keen runner, playing netball four times a week and always in the ocean.

Then a series of viral infections slammed her, each one knocking her back harder.

"I didn't have the energy to get up in the morning, have breakfast, and get changed, let alone survive a 10-hour day at school," she told Mamamia.

"I was just suffering this suffocating fatigue, really excruciating pain."

Ella would faint at doctors' appointments, urinate eight times an hour and lose a significant amount of weight.

Yet no one could figure out why. Specialist after specialist came up short.

Finally, after two years of waiting, an answer: severe myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS),which is a debilitating neuro-immune condition.

By that point, Ella, now aged 16, had left school. She was so unwell she couldn't even sit at the dinner table with her family.

"I was just so weak, I couldn't move my arms and my legs couldn't hold me upright," she said.

The swelling on the brain meant any kind of stimuli, such as light and sound, worsened her pain.

"I wasn't able to pass the time with watching TV or listening to music or even having friends come and visit," she said.

All she could manage was the four steps to her ensuite.

Soon, even that was too much.

In 2019, her condition led to an 18-month "semi-coma state", leaving her non-verbal and paralysed.

Ella wore a blindfold and earplugs 24/7. She didn't sit on a toilet for four years. She went five without hugging loved ones.

"I was alive but just not living," she said.

"All of those things were so dehumanising, not just for me, but for mum and dad, who were my full-time carers."

Light and sound was too much stimulation for Ella. Image: Supplied.

Something stirring inside.

Ella was told she had less than five per cent chance of recovery.

But eventually, and ever so slowly, her energy started to return in "very subtle shifts."

She went from the wiggle of a pinky finger to rolling herself over in bed. She started regaining speech and could tolerate some light.

"Something was stirring inside me, I felt parts of myself returning," she said.

For the first time in years, Ella connected with her friends. Catching up over text and FaceTime was bittersweet.

"I remember just opening Instagram and people who were my best friends just felt like strangers," she said.

"My parents were wiping my bum, and I'd never been more dependent on care, yet they were just enjoying so much freedom and independence, travelling the world."

The grief was immense.

"I was a real dreamer… to just have all of your dreams literally taken away from you without warning, losing the ability to talk and walk within a 15-minute time frame. Your whole identity just stripped bare."

For years, Ella's parents became her carers. Image: Supplied.

The moment Ella stood for the first time was cinematic.

It was 2.00am. She pressed the buzzer she wore around her neck, calling her parents in.

"Instead, I told them I didn't need the bedpan, which was the sole reason I usually pressed my buzzer, and that I was actually going to stand," she said.

With her dad gripping her arms, Ella's feet touched the carpet for the first time in years.

"It was actually incredibly humbling how something so simple required so much energy," she said.

In that moment, she caught sight of herself in the mirror — frail, with skin the colour of her white sheets.

"It was a real shock."

But the biggest shock was the realisation of what her life's milestones had become.

"I expected 'ordinary' milestones: my last day of school after finishing Year 12, my first time behind the wheel of a car and my first day at university, perhaps some young romances fizzling and new ones blooming," she said.

She wasn't prepared for the enormous weight her last times would hold — last time leaving her home before spending seven years confined to four walls, her last words before 18 months of silence, nor her last time using a toilet before three years of a bedpan.

Then came the firsts, and not the happy kind. First birthdays and Christmases spent in bed, blindfolded and unable to see family. Her first experience of not being able to wipe herself on the toilet and her first days being spoon-fed puréed baby foods.

"Thankfully, though, the past few years have been suffused with heart-expanding firsts: my first steps again (just like a baby), first time feeling running water on my skin, first time seeing another human's face (outside my immediate and very small circle of carers)."

After years, Ella was finally able to reconnect with her friends. Image: Supplied.

Ella's powerful message.

Today, Ella celebrates the first day she left the house as her "rebirth".

"People often tell me how lucky I am to have recovered and to be out living my life again," Ella reflected.

"And they're so right, I am. But I think what they fail to see is how lucky they are, too.

"The very things I had regained were the same things they had all along. The things they'd been taking for granted and doing with such ease, not an ounce of thought, were the things I'd been working towards as my single lifelong dream."

Ella now views life through a new lens. When she faces a worry or argument, she asks: "Would this have mattered to me when I was in a semi-coma or a wheelchair?"

"If the answer is yes, then I pour all my love and time into it," she says. "But so few things ever make that list now."

Ella now works part-time and recently went travelling. Image: Supplied.

Now 24, Ella recently travelled to Indonesia and hopes to share her story as a keynote speaker.

But life is far from easy. Simple tasks still take it out of her, and she often spends days in pain and exhausted.

"I want to highlight the severity [of ME] and the fact that my organs and cells were literally shutting down," she said.

But mostly, she wants to remind us of the power we have to change our lives.

"So often we're asked, 'What would you do if you had a few weeks to live?' and we say we'd travel more, forgive or quit the job," she said.

"But then, minutes after being asked the question, we go back to our old ways of living. We kind of just wait for a crisis to hit before we actually start living by what matters most."

You can follow Ella's journey on Instagram.

Feature image: Supplied.