Melbourne woman left with 'supernatural' abilities after surviving lightning strike in Yeezy slides: 'I now have built-in GPS'

A Melbourne woman has revealed the shocking moment she survived being struck by lightning on the Gold Coast in 2023.

Carly Electric was left completely paralysed 'for about 10 to 12 hours' after she was struck on the head in a lightning storm on Christmas night.  

She told Daily Mail about the shock event at the Australian Adult Industry Awards, and revealed the 'supernatural' side effects she has since experienced. 

'I got keraunoparalysis [lightning paralysis]. I became completely paralysed and I was in hospital and it took me about six months to get a lot of my function back,' she said.

'It's made me a really bad dancer. It's changed the colour of my eyes. I've got contacts in now and I have to wear bifocals.

'On the top of my head, I actually had to have a lot of acupuncture. I have these hotspots on the top of my head and I've got like red scarring down my scalp.' 

'I'm static to everything now. I feel superhuman. It's made me more creative, funnier,' she continued. 

'As soon as that happened, four weeks later, I started a podcast, I started writing comedy out of nowhere.'

Carly originally built a career as a high-end escort but has recently made the decision to transition out of sex work into stand-up comedy.

'I just feel like I became really lucky and like all this weird wonderful stuff started happening,' she said.

'I've got some weird like supernatural things going on now. I now have a built-in GPS. 

'I can picture a map in my mind and I know automatically where I am and where I'm going. I'm more susceptible to being struck by lightning again. 

'I'm also more susceptible to being electrocuted because now my body runs at a different frequency and I'm more attractive now to electricity.'

The adult entertainer also has concerns about long-term health effects.

She added that so few people have survived being struck by lightning that there are virtually no studies on how it might affect her in the future. 

'I just don't know what the long-term effect is. I can't find any information. There's not enough people [for studies] because no one survives,' she said.

'I feel like I've drastically taken years off my life. I'm actually at the moment having heart tests. I constantly have weird heart things going on. You know, numbness.'

Despite the downsides, Carly said being struck by lightning was 'the best thing that ever happened to her', and credits her survival to a pair of Yeezy slides. 

'I was wearing my Yeezy slides, and they're so big, and I think they're actually what saved my life. If I didn't have those on, I would have died,' she said.

Carly explained she got struck because she went out into her backyard to video a lightning storm. 

'A lot of people lost power for like two weeks. It was really bad. People lost their homes, and the lightning storm lasted for about two hours, no rain,' she said. 

'And so I was like, this lightning is insane. I'm Carly Electric, it's my childhood nickname, like I've been Carly Electric since I was a teenager. 

'I was wearing a lightning bolt necklace... All you can see in the video is a bright flash, and I'm like, "Oh," and I went blind instantly in my eye for a few seconds.

'I was like, "Whoa, I've gotta go inside," and I ran inside and within an hour I was paralysed.'

Carly said she didn't feel any pain when she was struck, but said the lightning created a loud 'bang' and lit up the whole sky until it 'looked like daylight for two seconds'.   

She went on to say that she began feeling the side effects almost as soon as she went inside where her sister was waiting. 

'I went inside. Started feeling really nauseous, really nauseous, like instantly. I started feeling really euphoric. My eyes were so dilated,' she recalled. 

'I said to my sister, "Have I ingested something?" I feel like I'm tripping. I feel really euphoric.

'I was getting pulsing waves of goosebumps travelling up me, like something out of X-Files, it was insane. And I'm feeling nauseous.'

Carly said that at the time she didn't realise she had been struck by lightning, saying that at first she had just witnessed a bright flash. 

But she explained that when she sat down on the couch to watch a TV show with her sister, her legs and arms suddenly became paralysed.  

'I could still turn my head and stuff like that and it just got worse and worse, over half an hour,' she said. 

'By the time the ambulance picked me up, I could still move my neck and my head and I could still talk normally. 

'In the ambulance, I lost my speech, and then by the time I arrived to hospital I couldn't move at all. I could only blink.'

Carly said that the paralysis gradually spread throughout her entire body as doctors tried to work out what was wrong.  

'I've never seen so many doctors in one room, they're all arguing and throwing ideas at each other,' she said. 

'I could feel that I had tears coming out of my eyes and I was thinking to myself, "I may never come back. I may never be able to talk or walk or move ever again." 

'I was freaking out, and then I don't know if they put me to sleep, but I was just unconscious after that for about 10 hours. 

'Then when I woke up, the doctors explained what it was and what was happening to me. About 24 hours later I was able to stand.

'But I didn't regain proper speech for about a week. It affected me drastically for a whole year. I'm really lucky.'

Carly said that she had joked her entire life about being struck by lightning because she was so fascinated by the phenomenon growing up. 

She earned the nickname 'Carly Electric' in childhood and even had lightning themed jewellery and tattoos when she was struck.    

'I never thought Carly Electric could be struck by lightning. I've joked about it my whole life,' she said.

'"Wouldn't it be a fun way to go out being struck by lightning? That would be so funny." I've always said that. 

'I was wearing at the time, a necklace that said electric with a lightning bolt that hangs on. I think that's why I went outside. 

'Any normal person would be like, "Don't go outside, you idiot."' 

Carly said she no longer gets as excited as she once did when a lightning storm arrives, adding that she instead just gets a wave of goosebumps.

It comes after the sex-worker-turned-comedian walked away with two awards at the Australian Adult Industry Awards last week.

She took home the awards for Best Adult Comedian and Director's Choice Female Entrepreneur.

Carly will next make an appearance at Sxhibition in Melbourne to share her new comedy show from September 18 to 20.