The singer who woke up to find that she could neither talk nor sing

She was named after American country music singer Crystal Gayle. And there was never a time in her life when she was not surrounded by songs.

“My father would have the radio on all the time and he would sing at the top of his lungs,” said Crystal Goh, 33.

Crystal giving a public performance in 2015.

“My favourite earliest memories were of me singing, dancing and performing for my family.”

Sounding strangled

One day in 2011, Crystal woke up one day to discover that she could not speak.

She planned to be a professional singer-songwriter, but was then working as a writer at an international Christian charity.

“My favourite earliest memories were of me singing, dancing and performing for my family.”

“I didn’t realise that I had lost my voice till I stepped into the office. There was a work-in-progress meeting and everyone had to give an update.

“When I tried to speak, it sounded like I had a very, very bad flu.”

Thinking the condition was the result of lack of sleep, Crystal went to see a GP. Then another, and another, and another.

When Crystal lost her voice, she thought it might have been from over-use, lack of rest or a virus.

“That was the period when I was working a full-time job while doing singing gigs in the evenings,” she said.

“It didn’t hurt but when I tried to speak, it sounded like I was being strangled. To speak each word, I had to take a deep breath. It was very tiring. I couldn’t sustain it.”

As weeks became months, it was clear that the condition was neither the result of stress nor the flu. Crystal turned to several specialists. 

“To speak each word, I had to take a deep breath. It was very tiring. I couldn’t sustain it.”

One finally gave her the diagnosis – spasmodic dysphonia.

For reasons unknown, the muscles that helped produce her voice was experiencing periods of spasms, causing interruptions in her voice and making it hard for her to speak.

The rare neurological disorder has no known treatment or cure.

“I immediately started crying in front of the doctor when he told me.”

It was a huge blow because she believed God had called her to be a singer.

Feeling cheated

In the weeks and months that followed, Crystal “tried very hard to believe I could recover”.

Trying to work was a challenge.

“I had really very, very wonderful colleagues who would pray with me, who were very understanding of the situation. But I felt I was not giving value.

“There were so many meetings that you have to talk and brainstorm ideas, and I couldn’t contribute.”

Voice therapy helped her recover some of her speech.  

“I had to learn to swap out certain words like those with the letter A. I learnt to take deeper breaths before saying certain words,” she said.

“I managed by interspersing my speech with a lot of filler sounds like ‘er’ to give myself more time to compose myself before saying something.”

But mostly, she withdrew from the world, her friends and life.

After about six months, a good friend asked Crystal to sing at her wedding.

An invitation to sing a self-penned song at a close friend’s wedding forced Crystal to find the courage to perform once more.

“She thought that if I sang, I would recover. I thought God would be moved and I would be completely well.

“I forced myself to practise and to show up,” said Crystal.

Though her voice was still breaking with every few words, Crystal turned up and sang. She explained to the guests the reason for the tremor in her voice.

To her surprise, people came up to her afterwards and told her they were moved by her singing.

“That incident helped me to see that I didn’t need to sing to perform. I could still sing to connect with people,” she said.

“God was helping me to see that I was not my voice. And that I could still be accepted even without a beautiful voice.”

But the healing she had hoped for did not happen.

“I went home feeling cheated by God. I had put myself out there but I didn’t get healed. I cried a lot.”

Getting rebuilt

Good friends rallied around her once more. One lent her his house so she could have a silent retreat.  

“I was not my voice. I could still be accepted even without a beautiful voice.”

“Again, I felt very cheated by God. Why is there so much noise? Don’t You want to let me have quiet time?”

Then, she felt God speak to her.

“He told me He was going to do a reconstruction in me. As much as I wanted it to be quiet and beautiful, it would take a while for me to be rebuilt.”

One of the many people praying for her was her boss.

Her boss was promoted to ask Crystal to read Isaiah 54:10.

When Crystal read the entire chapter, “everything clicked”. 

In it, the prophet talked about singing and bursting into song, and made reference to rebuilding the city of Jerusalem with beautiful gems. When Crystal read the entire chapter, “everything clicked”. 

“I knew that God was going to do something. I think God is very close to the broken. We tend to hear him better when we are going through tough times.” 

Out of that season, she wrote There Will Be Spring, a song about the hope Isaiah 54 talks about.

Crystal did not think she would have been able to pull through without her faith. 

Dust to diamonds

By the end of 2012, Crystal had been voice-less for over a year and a half.

She let her friends listen to her just-written There will be Spring.

“They thought the song would encourage people.”

So on Christmas Eve, Crystal and a few friends went to a home for girls to share her song and her story.

There, she saw a great need among the underserved youths. She began volunteering at the home, hoping to bring healing through creating music. 

The next year, she quit her job to do this work full-time. That was the birth of social enterprise Diamonds on the Street. Two friends later joined her.

“I named it Diamonds because these precious stones emerge after being tested under pressure and heat,” she explained.

Crystal sharing stories at a Diamonds on the Street event in 2014.

Diamonds on the Street helps at-risk youths turn their life experiences into songs. The programme, which came about through trial and error, teaches the teenagers to use stories and music to explore their relationships and feelings to better understand themselves.

“We create a safe space for them to reflect. For many, it is the first time they get to talk about their sometimes traumatising or shameful past,” explained Crystal.

Since then, Crystal has helped more than 200 vulnerable youths.

One teen she helped was a 15-year-old girl who was estranged from her older sister. Hoping to reconnect with her older sibling, the girl wrote her a song. After her sister heard the song, the two were able to talk more openly and their relationship improved.

Crystal has since helped close to 200 youths with her programme at Diamonds on the Street.

“Music can be a tool to communicate difficult emotions, and help us connect and know that we are not alone.”

Diamonds on the Street works with schools, homes and the Esplanade – Theatres on the Bay.

As she worked on Diamonds on the Street, Crystal’s voice quality slowly improved. She began to be more audible although her voice still trembled on bad days.

The graduation showcase of youths whom Crystal worked with under Diamonds on the Street.

But she began to doubt if it was really God that was healing her.

Time to come home

None of Crystal’s friends knew her struggle. They only knew she had stopped going to church.

“I felt like they might not be my friends if I told them,” she said.

Then an old friend from church asked to meet up with her.

“The first thing he says to me after not talking to me for some years was: ‘God told me to tell you to come home’.

A few days after that meeting, another old friend called her, inviting her to an evangelistic meeting. Crystal had received too many of such invitations since she left her church. She was sceptical.

“At that time, I thought she was probably looking through her contacts and had no choice but to ask me,” Cyrstal said.

But the words “come home” echoed in her heart and Crystal said yes to the invitation.

“I went half an hour late, hoping to sneak in but, to my surprise, there were only 10 people there. There was nowhere to hide.” 

She sat through the worship and message, mentally criticising and rejecting everything. But then, she found herself weeping. 

“I knew that physically I wasn’t able to cry. I was so against everything in my mind and my heart. It was something spiritual. I’ve never had such an experience before.”

At that meeting, Crystal also said a prayer. She had been struggling with unforgiveness. 

“I had tried everything to overcome it but it didn’t work. So, I asked God to help me to forgive and take away the bitterness.

Every time Crystal faltered in her faith, godly friends would come alongside her with prayers and words.

“And I felt the burden just lift, literally. That instant made me realise that God is powerful.”

After that, that friend who had asked her to the meeting would message or call her and pray with her every day for six months.

“She helped me to warm my heart back to God because my heart was quite cold.

Crystal performed and shared her story at the inaugural TEDxP&G Singapore 2016. Close to 500 P&G APAC employees attended the event.

Crystal is now a freelance writer, music teacher and singer-songwriter. She earned a Master in Music Education at the National Institute of Education to better design her music programmes.

As a musician, she has performed in front of more than 10,000 people at local and international events.

This is an excerpt of an article that was first published on Salt&Light.

Click here to join our Telegram family for more stories like Crystal’s.

Doctors gave Chew Chor Meng 18 months to live. It has now been 12 years

“I was a living zombie – I could only eat veggies and rice”