A woman was left completely paralysed, just minutes after complaining of an unusual headache after being out with her seven-year-old son.
Kate Green, from Rotherham, South Yorkshire, complained of "feeling funny" and within just 10 minutes the 42-year-old went from walking and talking, to mumbling and "frothing at the mouth".
Kate's husband Adam told Yorkshire Live : "She'd taken my son swimming and had just got back and walked in the house.
"She had just gotten into the hallway and said 'I feel really funny' and I asked when it had started and she had told me 'well just, I've got a headache in the back of my head' and I thought that was strange because you don't usually get a headache in the back, it's usually the front or the side."
Adam said that, within minutes, his wife was laid on the bed upstairs in the foetal position and had started to have trouble speaking and breathing properly.
"She said 'I don't feel right, I can't move', so I told her that I was calling the doctor and I knew it was serious because she didn't say 'don't'," Adam, 44, said.
The GP surgery told Adam to immediately ring for an ambulance.
Adam said: "Kate was murmuring and frothing at the mouth, that's when Stanley got on the bed and said 'mummy, mummy I love you mummy' and then Vicky thankfully arrived and took him downstairs.
"But Kate started breathing really weirdly, it was a growling sound - like a death rattle - she was really struggling to take a breath and she looked like she was locked in."
A paramedic told Adam that her symptoms were indicative of a severe bleed on the brain and when she was taken to Rotherham Hospital, staff told Adam that Kate had suffered an acute pontine stroke.
This type of stroke can lead to what is known as Locked-in Syndrome - where a patient is conscious and aware, but completely unable to move.
He said: "They effectively told me that I needed to call her family and I had to call them to say 'you need to come to say goodbye', as we thought the worst was going to happen."
Kate had been put into an induced coma when she arrived at the hospital so that doctors could assess what damage had been done to her brain.
Adam said that it did not take long for "small miracles" to begin happening as, a few days later, staff had turned off her ventilator to see how she would respond.
When Kate's ventilator was turned off, she opened her eyes and took a large breath.
Adam said: "But even at that point, there was no indication as to what quality of life she might have. The worst case scenario when she was admitted was that she would die, but then it kind of shifted slightly to she might be in a vegetative state and be in a nursing home all her life.
"But then, after 10 days, she opened her eyes and her occupational and speech therapists were asking her questions, so she was looking up for yes and down for no, so they'd ask her questions about her life and were trying to catch her out with some questions to see what her mental capacity was like.
"They'd ask her things like 'your husband is called John?' and she'd look down and they would say 'oh it's Adam, is it?' and she'd look up. Then, they used an alphabet board so they could communicate and she'd spell words out."
Adam added: "One of the first things I remember is coming onto the ward one morning, the speech therapist told me that she'd managed to spell my name, Stanley's name and the word 'love' - it completely did me.
"That was my almost epiphany that she was going to be alright because her brain is there and she's got a bloody big brain - she's very tenacious.
"She doesn't ever back out of anything that she says she's going to do. She's got so much to live for and there was no way she was going to lay back over this, she was going to fight it."
Though there have been some "horrific lows" over the last three months - such as coming to terms with the idea that Kate may have Locked-in Syndrome for the rest of her life - Adam said that there have also been moments of tremendous hope and joy.
And one of the biggest moments of joy was when Kate began to move the left side of her body, proving to Adam that she was determined to overcome her paralysis and begin recovering.
Adam said: "I think it was her left thumb that she moved first and things started coming back quite quickly on the left side. And then her toes started moving, against all the odds, it was absolutely remarkable.
"She's got pretty much full mobility in her left side now, but she has no strength and that'll come with physiotherapy."
Though she is still bedbound and living on the stroke ward of the hospital, she is speaking again and able to spend time with Adam and Stanley - who desperately misses his mum.
Adam said: "He misses his mum and is worried he's never going to hear her voice again - the voice it was before, because she sounds different now.
"But he comes to the hospital and tells her what he's been up to in the day. He's seven and he just misses his mum, that's probably what's driven Kate so much, is him."
Adam has launched a fundraiser so that Kate can get the care she desperately needs, and he has been blown away at the response - with over £17,000 worth of donations in less than 24 hours.
Adam said: "She's very, very well respected. I went in today and told her that we'd launched a GoFundMe page and she asked how it was going, I told her that it had gone over £15,000 and she just lost it, she burst into tears.
"We know it's a very, very long process, but she's doing all this against the odds. It was a very, very bleak picture and the consultant on the ward that she's on now said that, in his whole career, she's the only one who has ever survived this stroke."
The fundraiser website can be found here.
