1. Signs & Symptoms

16+ hour days on repeat, with no weekend breaks – this was my working routine for the month leading up to my first symptoms. I had recently started my own digital agency and was working my arse off to meet the goals of my clients. It’s no wonder that when I first felt numbness in my arm and the right side of my tongue, which made it slightly difficult to get words out… I shrugged it off as stress, overworking, or low blood sugar. After all, all symptoms subsided after 30 minutes so it was just a blip right?

At around 3pm the following Tuesday (Nearly exactly 1 week later), the same thing happened again while I was working on a client’s project – though this time I had numbness in the right side of my lower back. I called the NHS non-emergency line (111) to seek advice. Fearing that I was having a stroke, the operator called an ambulance for me, and I was taken into hospital for an emergency checkup.

Following an ECG, blood test, other basic checks, and 4 hours of waiting around, I was called into a doctor’s room to discuss my results. “We have diagnosed you as having migraines with neurological deficit”. It made sense! It explained the slight headaches and the numbness.

After discharge from the hospital, that night, the worst pain I had ever felt came in the form of a ‘migraine’. I could barely get up, and using paracetamol was beyond useless. Thankfully, the pain subsided the next afternoon, and I continued my routine without worry – though the numbness in my arm hadn’t subsided from the day before…

The following Tuesday, while on holiday, I had another episode; this time speech was even more difficult, and numbness was still in my right arm from the previous week. Headaches weren’t any more regular or severe, I had hoped that my break from work would solve issues.

Luckily, flights were cancelled on Sunday when I was scheduled to head home, so my next episode on Monday was witnessed by my girlfriend while having lunch. This time, speech was impossible. I couldn’t get any words out or even think of the words I wanted to say. I couldn’t hold my knife and fork, and I was pretty much useless and unable to communicate for 45 minutes. Once the speech issues had subsided, I managed to explain what was going on, and I was urged to get myself scanned ASAP.