A 22-year-old mum-of-two suffered an unexplained stroke while sitting at her Christmas dinner table.
Casey Singleton had been heading to bed on November 20 last year when she collapsed at the bottom of the stairs late at night.
Her partner Jack Berry, 25, had already gone to bed before she fell - finding her on the sofa the morning after staring ‘blankly’ into space unable to speak to him.
After spending weeks in hospital, the mum of two boys George, four, and Tommy, one, wanted to spend time at home in time for Tommy’s birthday and the holidays - only to suffer another stroke while sitting at her Christmas dinner table.
Casey, whose symptoms doctors still struggle cannot explain, says that it took days after her second stroke for her to realise she had suffered another before heading to hospital again.
She said: “When the first stroke hit, Jack had gone to bed because he thought I was tired. The night seemed to me like it went by in about an hour or half an hour - in my head it was all wrong.
“I had tried to speak to Jack when he went to bed, but it turned out no voice was coming from my mouth - I had not actually said anything, but I was sure I had.
“It really is scary to look back at, especially because I remember so much of it - but what I remember doing is different to what actually happened.
“I had tried to go up the stairs, but my right side was paralysed. I had crawled to them, and managed to get up one step, but just fell off twice. So then I had crawled back with one arm to the couch.
“To me though, it felt like I was just walking normally - but I was actually crawling. The next day I even felt like I had gone to work, and was hanging out with the kids, but actually I had just been lying completely silent on the sofa.”
Casey’s partner Jack said he found her totally silent on the sofa the next morning not moving, after waiting for an ambulance for ‘about fifteen minutes’ Casey eventually was seen by doctors at Preston hospital before being transferred to Blackpool hospital several days later.
Jack said: “I just didn’t know what was going on. She was just lying still, not moving, not talking on the sofa.
“She spent three days in Preston Hospital in a ‘zombie state’. I thought she was going to die to be honest, it was really difficult - especially as we had to leave our kids George and Tom with our parents.”
Casey says that she cannot even remember her time at Preston Hospital, where she had been for several days before she started to remember what was happening.
She said: “The first thing I remember after the stroke was needing the toilet, I eventually left Blackpool Hospital on December 6.
“When I got home I just felt scared. I had wanted to leave the hospital just because I wanted to be at home. It was Tommy’s birthday on the 10th of December - so I wanted to be back.
“Ever since the first stroke I also just feel different, it feels like the children act differently around me too, or like they dont like me. The boys dont treat me differently, but I can’t hold Tommy anymore and things like that.”
After spending a few weeks back at home taking serious medication to try and reduce any of the damage caused by her first stroke, Casey then suffered a second stroke at her Christmas table on Christmas day.
Her vision blurred, and she felt like she was about to fall off her chair, but she only realised that she had experienced another stroke later after a visiting physician suggested she go to the hospital.
She said: “I kept feeling like I was falling, but I thought I was just feeling the symptoms of my last stroke. Everyone just thought it was the same symptoms continuing - but it actually wasn’t.
“I still don’t know why I had the strokes, doctors can’t explain it really, which is why I’m hoping to spread awareness about the possibility that people can suffer these strokes.
“I never imagined that I could suffer a stroke at such a young age. I wasn’t aware that I could suffer one, and because of that I assumed what I was going through was normal.
“Obviously I know I need to reach out if I suffer similar symptoms again, but even after I had my second stroke I didn’t realise until a physio came over on the 27th.
“The physio came over to my house, and when I mentioned to them that I had suffered some more symptoms that were giving me some pain since the stroke on Christmas day, they said I should go to the hospital.”
Since suffering her first stroke Casey has been unable to work and her partner Jack has lost his job in order to look after her.
The pair are now fundraising to try and keep themselves afloat during this period of transition while they work out what to do with their future.
Casey added: “My attention is now lost, I can’t even watch TV because my attention is gone. I stare into space a lot. I really miss me, I miss the old me.
“I used to be able to shower on my own, but I can’t now. Jack has to help me. It’s so hard, and I can’t even look after the kids because I just can’t physically - I miss them and being able to look after them so much.
“Obviously we have a really supportive family, but I can’t work, and until I recover Jack has to care for me and the kids - which is difficult for both of us. Life has really changed.
“Even something as simple as going out, we have to put the kids in a pram - but I also need pushing in a wheelchair. It’s things like that which make life much more difficult.”
You can donate to Casey and Jack’s GoFundMe page here: https://www.gofundme.com/f/mother-of-two-has-strokes
