Emilia Clarke, 32, revealed she suffered from two brain aneurysms that required life-saving surgery. Her debilitating condition began in 2011 soon after she had finished filming for Game of Thrones’ first season. Emilia wrote an essay for The New Yorker and explained her health problems. Emilia began to suffer from extremely painful headaches which felt like “an elastic band was squeezing my brain.”
The pain she endured became so intense that she had to “almost crawl” back to the locker room before falling to her knees and becoming “violently, voluminously ill”.
Writing in the New York post, Emilia said: “Meanwhile, the pain – shooting, stabbing, constricting pain, was getting worse.
At some level, I knew what was happening: my brain was damaged,” she wrote.
Emilia was then rushed to the hospital and diagnosed with subarachnoid haemorrhage which is an uncommon type of stroke caused by bleeding on the surface of the brain.
She explained: “If I was to live and avoid terrible deficits, I would have to have urgent surgery. And, even then, there were no guarantees.”
Emilia underwent a three-hour surgery and spent nearly two weeks recovering.
Sadly, the surgery wasn’t entirely successful and Emilia was left unable to remember anything, including her own name.
“In my worst moments, I wanted to pull the plug,” she revealed. “I asked the medical staff to let me die.
My job, my entire dream of what my life would be, centred on language, on communication.
Without that, I was lost. Was sent back to the ICU and, after about a week, the aphasia passed. I was able to speak.”
I know from personal experience that the impact of brain injury is shattering
Emilia Clarke
After a week, the aphasia passed and Emilia began to regain her speech.
However, during promotion for Game Of Thrones, the actor began to feel weak and had to take morphine during interviews due to the excruciating pain.
In 2013, a brain scan revealed that Emilia’s second aneurysm had doubled in size and required another operation.
Unfortunately, again for Emilia, the operation failed and Clarke suffered a “massive bleed” forcing doctors to operate again, this time accessing there brain through her skull.
While recovering from the second operation, Emilia suffered from anxiety and panic attacks and felt like “shell of herself”.
“I know from personal experience that the impact of brain injury is shattering. Recovery is long-term and rehabilitation can be difficult to access.
Brain injury can be an invisible illness and the subject is often taboo.”
The actor has now made a full recovery and hopes to shed a light on injuries to the brain by launching, SameYou, a charity aimed at supporting young people with brain injuries.
A brain aneurysm rarely causes any symptoms unless it bursts.
Unruptured brain aneurysms occasionally cause symptoms if they’re particularly large or press against tissue or nerves inside the brain.
The NHS described symptoms of an unruptured brain aneurysm which include:
- Visual disturbance
- Pain above or around the eye
- Numbness or weakness on one side of the face
- Difficulty speaking
- Headaches
- Loss of balance
- Difficulty concentrating or problems with short-term memory
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