There will always be something that will never remain the same in a person after surviving a stroke. Mild or severe, a stroke can bring about changes in a person such as loss of memory, loss of muscle control and such.
However, there are a few stroke survivors who had changed drastically, and quite bizarrely so, once they recovered from the “brain attack”. Let’s have a look at some of the strangest stories of how people changed after surviving stroke.
1. Malcolm Myatt – the man who can’t be sad
in 2013, Malcolm realized a huge change in him after spending 19 weeks in the hospital after a stroke. The 68 year old, lorry driver survived the stroke but it affected his brain’s frontal lobe – a part that’s crucial for identifying emotions. However, Myatt got the best bargain out of a stroke attack ever.
With the frontal lobe of his brain affected, he was left unable to feel sadness any longer. Malcolm, who had always been a cheerful man takes it as an advantage because being depressed doesn’t help anyone, anyway.
2. Chris Birch – the stroke that changed his sexuality
Chris Birch was 26 year old rugby player and already engaged to his girlfriend. However, everything changed when he Chris had a stroke attack one day while at training. When Chris finally recovered, he was a changed man. He declared he was gay, broke up with his girlfriend, quit rugby and his bank job.
He now works as a hair dresser and lives above the shop with his boyfriend. He lost oodles of weight since the incident and looks nothing like his rugby playing days.
3. Alun Morgan – The man who started speaking a different language
In 2012, Alun Morgan survived a stroke at the age of 81. However, upon recovering, Morgan could not remember a word of English – the language he has been speaking all his life. The words that came out of his mouth were fluent Welsh. He was 10 years old when he moved out of Wales during World War 1 and never really got the chance to pick up the language. However, as a result of the stroke, his memories of early childhood with people speaking Welsh, which had remained deep rooted in his sub-conscience for 70 years, surfaced up and now Welsh is all that he can speak.
4. Linda Walker – The woman who developed a Jamaican accent
In 2006, 60 year old Lina Walker lost her Newcastle accent forever after surviving a stroke. At first, her her sister-in-law said she sounded Italian and then her brother said she sounded Slovakian. There were a few who found her speaking in a French Canadian accent as well. Linda had no idea what people were talking about until her therapist played a tape of her speech. The Foreign Accent Syndrom is often caused when a small part of the brain, that affects speech, is damaged. Linda Walker, who feels as if her identity is lost and says she doesn’t the way she has changed at all.
5. Ken Walters – An engineer who became an artist
Walters went into a depression of 19 years when after a terrible accident that left him wheelchair bound on 1986. In 2005, Walters suffered from a stroke but this turned out to be something he badly needed. When Ken, almost paralyzed, lay on his bed with nothing but a pen and a pad, he realized that that there was a doodler in him which never really was discovered before. The stroke let him discover his artistic side and went on to become a digital artist, even bagging a job with EA games at the age of 51.
6. An unnamed woman in Genevea – She felt third limb growing in her body
When diagnosed at the Geneva University Hospital, the FMRI or the functional magnetic resonance imaging pointed out that the woman can actually feel what she had described as a third arm in her body. The doctors have coined the term SPL or supernumerary phantom limb for the phenomenon which is believed to be a stroke induced imagination. The doctors were quite amazes when they found her brain reacting as if it actually occurred when she moved her imaginary arm as asked by the doctors.
7. Mr. A – The man who became dangerously generous
According to a 2013 case study of a 49 year old Brazilian businessman, Mr. A, as he is called in the study, a stroke attack left the man pathologically generous. According to doctors, the stroke disrupted a sub-cortical region of the brain that is related to higher levels of thinking. As a result, the Brazilian businessman was seen giving away money, food and drinks in excessive amounts.