A person with no speech may still have normal Receptive and Inner Language Skills but be mistakenly diagnosed as a "vegetable," with no communication ability.
In addition, she suffered from the terrible isolation that occurs when the language bridge is broken.
It was six years before someone became suspicious that she was not a "vegetable," and began to explore her actual language abilities.
Finally she was freed from her body prison through the use of computers and other alternative forms of expressive language.
Had some one analyzed her language processes more thoroughly in the beginning, she would not have had to suffer so severely so long!
History is full of such cases. The term "deaf and dumb" is testimony to the old notion that deaf individuals, who typically lack receptive language, have little language capacity. To the contrary, they are lacking in only one small area of language processing.
NOTES: See article on Julia.