Céline Dion Offers Peak Into ‘Unimaginable’ Crisis on Camera Living With Stiff Person Syndrome

Céline Dion's struggle was laid bare in front of the cameras in a harrowing scene as part of a documentary. The newly released Prime Video documentary I Am: Céline Dion fearlessly offers a painfully intimate depiction of her battle with stiff-person syndrome, an immunological and neurological disorder that causes muscle spasms and has kept the Grammy-winning singer from performing in recent years, per E! News.

Shortly after recording her song Love Again, Dion experienced a deeply painful spasm during a physical therapy session that was being recorded for the documentary. Throughout the medical crisis, the camera did not stop recording. "This is your first spasm for today?" Dion's sports medicine therapist Terrill Lobo asked her. "Or did you have any others, too?"

Lobo then added, "Part of the disease is that, as soon as you go into a contraction, sometimes the signal to release it, doesn't understand it," when she informed him it was her first of the day. For this reason, her foot eventually remained in a constricted position. After that, Lobo tried to relax Dion's foot by having him lie face down on a massage table. "This gives us an indication that her body, her brain right now is overstimulated," Lobo told the camera. "And there's something going on and she keeps spasming. That could lead to a crisis."

The emotional My Heart Will Go On singer squeezed a teammate's hand to communicate even though she was unable to talk at that point in the video. Dion's hands slowly began to relax after she received a nasal spray. "It's sounding like she's coming out," Lobo said. "And if she goes back into a spasm, then we'll do a 9-1-1," the physician explained.

Her staff was concerned as they observed the spasms, which appeared to linger anywhere from thirty minutes to an hour. Her muscles eventually relaxed to the point where she could sit up and talk normally once more. "Every time something like this happens, it makes me feel so embarrassed. I don't know how to express it, you know, to not have control over yourself."

Speaking to TODAY, Dion's physician Dr. Amanda Piquet explained what exactly happened to Dion's body. "That anxiety, that panic, that continued spasm that was not breaking then very quickly triggered just a complete whole body spasm. This is a spasm that is occurring, and patients are aware of what's going on. There's a lot of anxiety, there's a lot of panic, your adrenaline's rushing."

When her physical therapist speculates that her exhilaration from singing earlier may have contributed to the stiff person syndrome attack, the legendary singer wondered out loud, "If I can't get stimulated by what I love, then I'm going to go on stage, and you're going to put the pulse oximeter on me and turn me on my back?" she asked. "It's scary, I know," her PT replied. "It's hard. This is not the end of your journey."