How Did Nina End Up In A Coma On General Hospital?
Nina Reeves (Cynthia Watros) has lived a rather tumultuous life, particularly after waking up from a 20-year coma. She can be a force of nature, similar to Carly Corinthos (Laura Wright), and the two have recently gone head to head in a court battle over Nina's legal right to see her grandson Wiley (via Soap Dirt).
Along the way, Nina has made some pretty questionable choices. Some of those choices include inducing labor in Ava Jerome (Maura West) and stealing her baby, plotting revenge against Valentin Cassadine (James Patrick Stuart) for trying to pass off Sasha Gilmore (Sofia Mattsson) as her daughter, and hiding the fact that the presumed dead mob boss Sonny Corinthos (Maurice Benard) was actually alive and living in the town of Nixon Falls (via Soaps In Depth).
Nina was originally played by Michelle Stafford, who truly sold the fact that her character was a little unhinged to say the least. In 2019, Watros stepped in to take over the role, picking up where Stafford left off while making the character her own. But what was the situation that rendered Nina comatose to begin with?
Diabolical origins
It turns out that Nina Reeves had been married to Dr. Silas Clay (played by the character hopping Michael Easton), who had an affair with Ava Jerome which resulted in her getting pregnant. In an attempt to save their marriage, Nina also wanted to get pregnant with Silas' baby (via Soaps She Knows).
Nina's father had left his entire fortune solely to her. Her mother Madeline Reeves, played by "Knotts Landing" star Donna Mills, wanted to control Nina, thereby controlling the money. When she learned that Nina was pregnant, she gave her an overdose of antidepressants with the intent of causing a miscarriage. The result was not what Madeline was looking for, however, as it only caused Nina to become comatose (via Soaps In Depth).
Madeline eventually told Silas that Nina had died while in the coma (via Soaps She Knows), but in the soap world secrets never stay secret for very long. Silas ended up going to Port Charles and struck up a romance with Sam McCall (Kelly Monaco). Detective Nathan West (Ryan Paevey), who believed he was Nina's brother, came to town to investigate Silas for Nina's murder. Ultimately, it was revealed that Nina was not actually dead, but was still very much in a coma (via Soap Central).
Eventually, Nina woke up and found her way back to Port Charles, just in time to interrupt Silas and Sam's blossoming love affair.
Tragedy for Nina
When Nina Reeves saw that the world and the people she loved had moved on without her, she got caught up in several revenge schemes. After stealing Ava Jerome's baby, Nina ended up in Shadybrook because she plead not guilty by reason of insanity. For a short time, she hooked up with Franco Baldwin (Roger Howarth), who also had a previous relationship with Ava. Nina also had a horrible marriage to Ric Lansing (Rick Hearst), who was only in it to help Nina's mother, Madeline Reeves, steal her money, as well as a failed marriage to Valentin Cassadine (via Soaps In Depth).
It turns out that Nina did not have a miscarriage when she was in the coma, but gave birth to a girl that was quickly put up for adoption. That girl, the scheming Nelle Benson (Chloe Lanier), grew up and came to Port Charles terrorizing several characters including Carly Corinthos and her son Michael Corinthos (Chad Duell). Tragically, it was after Nelle's death that Nina found out they were mother and daughter, which shattered her world and led to Nina fighting Michael and Willow Tait (Katelyn MacMullen) for her right to visit her only blood relative, her grandson Wiley.
It seems that since coming out of the coma, nothing has gone Nina's way and she ultimately lost the court battle (via Soap Opera Spy).