Table 2.

Supporting data

Central phenomenon: recalibration of the self
Main theme 1: ‘From prior self to current self’ Sasha: ‘I didn’t realize I couldn’t walk. I thought I could and I tried to get out of bed loads of times, but up here I was weak (legs) and the top of my arms were weak as well. I couldn’t do it’. Sarah: ‘I don’t ever look at myself in the mirror and there is a mirror in that bathroom, I just happened to catch sight of my whole body almost and I nearly died. I thought; that doesn’t resemble the person that I am’.
Episodic memory loss	ICU admission Sasha: ‘… that’s when I don’t know, it’s a real black after that (the emergency room)’. Sadiq: ‘That is a black. That is a blank. Totally blank’. John: ‘I must have been in and out of consciousness, because I don’t remember anything’. Ben: ‘I had a bad fall, collapsed… that’s all I remember’.
	Rehabilitation and mobilisation EJC: ‘[W]hat was your memory of getting moving after you woke up with the tubes attached?’ Ben: ‘I don’t really have much memory of it’. EJC: ‘Do you remember any of the rehab on ICU?’ Martin: ‘Not to start with, no’. David: ‘It was Dan (ward physiotherapist) who taught me to sit on the edge of the bed’. EJC: ‘Do you remember getting into the chair for the first time?’ Michelle: ‘It was with Tom (the ward physical therapist)’.
Hallucinations and delusions	John: ‘I kept thinking I could see like people with hoodies and they were like assassins, trying to get in’. David: ‘I was taken into Soho (Central London) by some people and stuck under a glass floor, lying under a glass floor with formaldehyde around me. I was encased’. Ben: ‘I operated on Margaret Thatchers cat and there was eight other people in the house and three of them got shot… I remember waking up with the fear that I was going to get shot’. Carolyn: ‘I was trying to use my mobile (to escape), and the same number kept on pressing and I remember panicking’.
Weakness	George: ‘Nothing, I couldn’t move my hand. I couldn’t move and that was really scary. Really scary’. Richard: ‘I couldn’t do anything. I was paralyzed from the neck down… I still felt like I had sensation in my legs and my arms, I just couldn’t move them’. Carolyn: ‘I couldn’t even stand up. I was really very, very weak’. John: ‘I couldn’t do anything. I mean literally, I couldn’t move, I could just barely move my fingers’. David: ‘I couldn’t move. I couldn’t move at all. I could blink, that’s about it’. Martin: ‘… couldn’t walk, couldn’t do nothing’. Richard: ‘You are reliant entirely on the people around you, for everything really… that’s difficult’.
Noxious cycle of ICU	Sarah: ‘I didn’t want to do it (physiotherapy). I used to dread them coming, any excuse to get out of it. I was just so tired’. John: ‘Physically tiring, emotionally… you’re like “sh*t really? I’ve got to do it (mobilization) now? I haven’t got any energy at all”’. George: ‘There were some days when they’d (physiotherapist) come and they’d get me into the chair, and they’d want to do some work on the zimmer frame. They’d come back (from getting the zimmer frame) and I’d be asleep’. Sarah: ‘People kept telling me to read, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t’ actually physically read. They’d bring me the menu and I just couldn’t do it, and then I’d fall asleep’. Sarah: ‘… then I just accepted it (weakness), going… on the hoist and, you lose all dignity when you’re in that state you just accept it, and you just let them help you as much as possible and when you’ve done your, you know bits of physio, exhausted, you go back to bed again, sleep again. You know it tended to be like that’.
Main theme 2: ‘From current self to construction of the future self’ Ben: ‘The first days when I couldn’t move… I was disillusioned with the whole thing, and I thought, “This is never going to work”… I couldn’t see how anything could turn round, but I was told just to trust. But that period was very difficult because when you don’t see any light at the end of the tunnel, it’s difficult to sort of engage with it, and it’s difficult to trust… There was plans in my head, but it’s difficult to kind of have them if you think it’s just a waste of time what you’re doing. Now I know that there is (light at the end of the tunnel)… and I believe I’ll be walking next week, they’ve (physiotherapists) let me believe that’.
Recovery milestones and goal setting	Matthew: ‘Let the patient realize that he is not capable of doing that, or this, or whatever… don’t tell him’. Tom: ‘Everyone’s functions, and how they are improving, might not be quite so obvious to the patient’. Carolyn: ‘The other day the whole ward congratulated me- and even now I feel embarrassed – because I washed myself. I didn’t wait until now to know how to wash myself; I thought it was so stupid’. Jim’s wife: ‘We didn’t want to set the goals, because we didn’t know what goals to set’. Sadiq: ‘It depends on the person. If a person is shooting to the high, they might do it (achieve their goal), but sometimes shooting too much to the high might break your neck. If they are too sick, they cannot talk, you are in the dark and you have to put your own objectives’. Researcher: ‘What have been the things that have kept you going?’ Sasha: ‘I think Gemma (daughter) and her dad, they’ve been so supportive. He’s been down every day, and Gemma sometimes twice a day *starts crying*… sorry… I suppose if it wasn’t for them, I wouldn’t be… *crying- unable to finish sentence*’. Richard: ‘obviously I was doing it (rehab) for me primarily, but knowing how much concern and love she has for me, and knowing how much it would mean to her and how much of a relief it would be to her… The fact that she was, you know with me for as long as she was, and as strong as she was… I don’t know. I never thought my mum was that strong’.

ICU, intensive care unit.