A woman left in a coma after a horse riding accident is re-learning how to speak - by singing Harry Styles karaoke.

Katie Tysome, 50, was blue-lighted to hospital after she was found unconscious in a stable yard under a broken metal gate and with her horse, Rupert, roaming free.

Katie - who spent over a month in a coma and remembers nothing of the incident or the eight months after - was diagnosed with traumatic brain injury.

Now living in care, she has had to relearn how to walk, talk, and eat - and says her life is "unrecognisable" compared to before. "

Katie is a big Harry Styles fan and has listened to his music to help her learn to form words and string sentences together again.

Thanks to fundraising efforts by husband, Mark Tysome, 54, renovations to their home are finally underway and she plans to move home by the end of this year.



Mark, who works in IT, from Walkern, Hertfordshire, said: "Katie was trying to communicate but just couldn't get it out. Music has been something that's really helped her."

"She would get out of bed for an hour or so and do a karaoke session. "

"She fell in love with Harry Styles, and has still got posters of him up from her Harry Styles themed birthday."

"It's been a long, slow process, but she loves being social and talking to people."

CCTV from the day of the accident shows Katie running to the field but not what happened when she got there.

Mark said: "What we think happened is some escaped ponies from a field next-door panicked the horse while Katie was mucking out."

"She must have gone to sort it out, but the horse had obviously got the metal gate in the field off its hinges somehow and knocked her to the floor where she banged her head."

After another rider found Katie, a former PR company owner, around 45 minutes later on June 12, 2022, a road and air ambulance was called.

When Katie arrived at Addenbrooke's Hospital, she underwent emergency surgery to remove part of her skull and fix a brain bleed.

She then spent two months in critical care and was diagnosed with traumatic brain injury.

During this time, Katie had a titanium plate fitted to her head.

Mark said: "It was just terrible. I was there every day. "

"Everything was so uncertain. The consultant said Katie could either make a full recovery or spend the rest of her life as she is now. "

"There has been lots of ups and downs, but you just get on with it and adjust the best you can. "

"That first month I was just hoping and praying that she will wake up and recognise me, and luckily she did."

Katie doesn't remember regaining consciousness and says the first thing she can remember was visiting a garden eight months later.

She was then moved to a rehab unit in Northwick Park hospital, where for six months she suffered muscle spasticity and seizures.

Mark said: "She had her neck to the side, her arm up in the air, and legs and feet all over the place."

"She was in a lot of distress, so they put her on an anti-psychotic drug. She used to think she should be able to walk, so would get out of bed but just ended up in a pile on the floor."

"I used to turn up and I could hear her screaming in pain from down the corridor."

Katie was then moved to the Marbrook Centre, a specialist care home, where she received one-to-one care for three months.

She moved into Stagenhoe Park Neurological Care Centre in November 2023 where she has lived ever since.

With daily visits from her husband, Katie has relearnt to walk, talk, and eat again.

But she longs for home and to spend more time with her children, aged 27 and 19.

Katie said: "To move home would mean everything to me. I've been so blue and I think about it all the time. I miss my children so much."

"My life has changed immeasurably. I'm missing the fun as well as just being normal." "

Thanks to donations made to a fundraising page, and five triathlons done over one weekend, Mark has raised over £20,000 to make their house more wheelchair friendly, meaning Katie could move home by the end of this year.

Mark said: "I feel amazingly grateful but also guilty for asking."

"It's been hard but seeing the path to Katie coming home full time means it's getting easier."

In the meantime, Katie continues to do the things she loves, attending Glastonbury and Latitude music festivals, joining a local choir and even visiting Rupert, who is on loan to a new rider.

You can support Mark's fundraiser here: https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-katie-move-back-home-after-traumatic-brain-injury