Importance Score: 45 / 100 🔵
Emilia Clarke’s Health Journey: Battling Brain Aneurysms During Game of Thrones Fame
Emilia Clarke, renowned for her role in Game of Thrones, faced real-life battles alongside her on-screen fictional conflicts. In 2019, she publicly shared her harrowing experience in The New Yorker, detailing her fight for survival in an essay titled “A Battle for My Life,” revealing her struggles with a brain aneurysm.
The First Alarming Incident
Recounting the initial alarming incident, Clarke described a severe headache during a workout.
“I reached the restroom, collapsed to my knees, and began to vomit profusely,” the acclaimed actress wrote. “Simultaneously, the pain – sharp, intense, tightening pain – intensified. Subconsciously, I recognized the gravity of the situation: my brain was undergoing damage.”
Diagnosis and Initial Treatment
Following the onset of these critical symptoms, she was immediately transported to a medical facility for a brain scan.
“The diagnosis was swift and serious: a subarachnoid hemorrhage (SAH), a critical type of stroke resulting from bleeding in the space surrounding the brain,” the Emmy-nominated performer explained. “I had suffered an aneurysm, an arterial rupture.”
Clarke underwent urgent surgery to repair the aneurysm. She described the pain as “excruciating.” During her initial recovery, she endured aphasia, experiencing episodes of “speaking incoherently.”
Fortunately, “the aphasia subsided” approximately one week later, Clarke noted, and she was discharged from the hospital a month after her admission.
Discovery of a Second Aneurysm
During a routine brain scan in 2013, medical professionals discovered another growth that had “doubled in size,” necessitating a second surgical intervention.
Second Surgery and Complications
“Upon waking from the procedure, I was overcome with intense pain,” she recounted. “The medical intervention had been unsuccessful. I experienced a significant hemorrhage, and the physicians communicated frankly that my chances of survival were perilous unless another operation was performed. This time, they needed to access my brain via a traditional craniotomy – through my skull.”
Road to Recovery and Current Health
Thankfully, Clarke affirmed, she has since made a full recovery and is now “at one hundred percent.”