Eagles Of Death Metal‘s Tuesday Cross has woken up after being in a coma since January.
The 31-year-old bassist and keyboardist – real name Marina Cardenas – is the fiancée of EODM frontman Jesse Hughes.
According to Billboard, she had been in a vegetative state for approximately six weeks following an asthma attack that sent her into cardiac arrest. Cardenas suffered brain damage as a result, the outlet reports.
Hughes, who had not seen his fiancée for 51 days, took Billboard along as he visited Cardenas after she had come around.
“In a few days, she’s shown more progress than she has in the entire previous months,” he explained. “And I guess it just goes to show when you acknowledge someone is trying to recover, give them the opportunity and you have faith, anything is possible.
“She is finally improving. She has an army of people who support and believe in her. It is Tuesday’s Army. She is a fighter. She is our miracle.”
Elsewhere in the report, Hughes said he had “barely been able to process” the ordeal since he found Cardenas “dying on the floor”. “But every single day, she is slowly getting better,” he continued.
Hughes explained that his fiancée is now “lucid” and “understands when I talk to her”, adding: “When Tuesday recognised me, it was the best moment of my life. The only thing that matters now is her.”
The singer was told by the Mountain View Convalescent Hospital in Los Angeles, California that Cardenas was out of the coma when they transferred her to their facility from Glendale Memorial Hospital on March 8.
He also claimed to Billboard that Glendale “wanted [Cardenas] to be pulled off life support”, explaining: “There was no consideration for the possibility before. Now there is.”
Hughes said: “Now there is an expectation that it is even possible for her to get better and recover, which is what crushed me in the beginning with Glendale hospital.”
Per the article, a spokesperson for Glendale Memorial Hospital said they “cannot disclose any information regarding any patient due to HIPAA regulations and California privacy laws”.
Billboard claimed that Cardenas’ mother, Maria Virginia Gaytan, had blocked Hughes from seeing or communicating with her daughter or receiving any updates on her condition – despite him having documents to show that his fiancée gave him power of attorney over her healthcare last year.