On March 14, 2025, at 24 years old, I had a stroke. At the time, I was living in New York City and working as a consultant. I was used to being busy, independent, and constantly on the go. I had health issues, but they were hiding under the surface. A stroke wasn’t even remotely on my radar.
My stroke was an ischemic cerebellar stroke caused by a spontaneous dissection of my left vertebral artery. In human words, I tore an artery in my neck that was supplying blood to my brain, which caused a blood clot to form.
The day of my stroke
The day of my stroke, I woke up feeling dizzy. The second I opened my eyes, it felt like the room was spinning around me. I couldn’t see clearly. I tried to make it to the bathroom to throw up, but my vertigo was too overpowering, and I fell onto the floor.
In my anxious state, I called my mom in Sweden, who told me to call an ambulance (thank god for moms!).
After that, everything happened very quickly. I remember the EMTs (who definitely thought I had some sort of stomach bug) peppering me with questions about the past 24 hours. I remember being surrounded by seven doctors in the ER, each asking questions and performing various neurological tests. I remember being rushed to get a CT scan and how the entire vibe shifted dramatically after that. I remember FaceTiming my mom, just to have a doctor grab my phone and write down her contact information (never a good sign).
I texted my friends from the ER and told them I was scared. They didn’t hesitate to come to the hospital. This was a key turning point for me. I had built so much of my identity around being fiercely independent and able to handle everything on my own. My friends and parents (who flew from Sweden to New York to be with me in the hospital) were so supportive during my stay in the hospital.
Immediate recovery
The main part of my brain that was damaged by my stroke was the cerebellum, which controls your balance. As a result, balance was my main deficit. I also had right-sided weakness in my arm and leg.
The first hurdle was relearning how to walk. After a few days on complete bed rest, the physical therapists slowly started working with me. First, all I could manage was standing up for a few seconds with support. I remember on one of my first walks, just outside of my hospital room and back, I was so exhausted that my nurse had to order an EKG to make sure there wasn’t something wrong with my heart (Spoiler alert: There wasn’t. Well, besides a future POTS diagnosis, but that’s a story for later). Each step was exhausting, but necessary.
I got used to being dependent on others for nearly everything. My parents, and a kind social worker, helped me file for disability and navigate insurance issues. My mom helped me cut my food and brush my hair. I slept for most of the day while my loved ones worked tirelessly in the background to plan my care.
Following my week in the ICU, I spent two weeks in inpatient rehab. Here, I focused on regaining my strength, with daily physical and occupational therapy. I was surrounded by patients who were decades older than me, and I was struggling to wrap my head around the fact that I had become a stroke survivor before even figuring out how to be an adult. I remember looking around at all of the 70+ year olds and thinking to myself “I don’t belong here.” My rehab therapists were amazed by my physical progress (“I guess that’s the neuroplasticity of a young brain for you!”) but the real challenge was emotional. I felt alone, confused, and unsure of how to move forward.
The months after
For months, recovery was my entire life. It was wake up, eat, nap, go to physical therapy, nap, eat, repeat. It became an endless string of appointments, medications, scans, questions, and most importantly to me, an obsessive search to understand why this had happened.
I turned to TikTok to start sharing my story, and began finding others who had gone through the same thing as me. I clung to this sense of belonging during a time when I otherwise felt completely lost and alone.
As the months went on, my body slowly got stronger, but my old life started to feel like a distant dream. I left New York to move back to Sweden, where my parents could take care of me. I abandoned my career, realizing I never wanted to return to the high-stress world I had previously known. I started prioritizng my health for the first time in my life. The identity that I had built around being independent and invincible deteriorated.
In Sweden, recovery was still my sole purpose. I enrolled in an outpatient recovery program, did my physical therapy exercises at the gym, and spent my days otherwise resting in my bed with my childhood dog.
Eventually, though, I regained enough energy that survival stopped being the only goal.
Moving forward
Once I had enough physical strength back, I realized I wanted to start immersing myself in the community again. I started slow — meeting up with my cousin for coffee, going on a walk with my dog, or FaceTiming my friends.
I knew now that I didn’t want to go back to how my life was before, but I didn’t know what the alternative was. I didn’t want to spend my life chasing after a career. I enjoyed the slower pace of Sweden and now saw the value of focusing on your relationships and health.
Before my stroke, I was very good at pushing myself. I could be exhausted and keep going. I could be anxious and keep going. I could be completely miserable, on the verge of a mental breakdown, and somehow still keep going. I treated my ability to function as evidence that everything must be fine.
My stroke forced me to stop pushing and start living.
Where am I now?
I’m still recovering. In fact, I view recovery as a life-long process. But I’m also returning to some sense of “normalcy” and building a life in Stockholm.
I can now spend an entire day with my friends without it wiping me out. I’m studying psychology again and planning to go back to school full-time when the time is right. I even started dating and am in my first healthy relationship.
I’m trying to make peace with the fact that recovery might not mean returning to who I was before. Maybe it’s figuring out who I am now.
That’s part of why I created Young Stroke Survivor. When I was in early recovery, I wanted practical information and stories from people my age who had experienced something similar. I hope this page can provide some of that. Most importantly, I want it to serve as a reminder to young stroke survivors that they are not alone.
I also want to talk about what happens after the immediate crisis is over. Surviving is one thing, but figuring out what you want to do with your life after you’ve survived is another. I don’t have all the answers yet, and I expect I never will, but I hope you’ll stick with me as I carve out a way forward.
