Snowboard stroke ‘luck’
A TEACHER today revealed she feels lucky to be alive after a fall during a snowboarding lesson led to her suffering a stroke.
The chances of suffering such a brain injury are around one in a million.
A TEACHER says she feels lucky to be alive after a simple fall fall during her first ever snowboarding lesson led her to suffer a stroke.
The chances of it happening are around one in a million.
Shona Storr, 33, from Stepps, recalls how she woke up hours after the accident at Glasgow Ski and Snowboard Centre and the room was, “doing a 360” and she realised something very serious had happened.
She said: “My husband John is a snowboarder and I thought I would give it bash. I went to my first lesson and I fell backwards and the snowboard spun around. I landed in a really awkward position.
“After it happened I didn’t feel well but I just kept going with the lesson because I thought, I’m not going to embarrass myself.
“I just brushed it off and then when I came off, I said to my husband John, I feel bit hot and sick and my neck was sore but I just thought I had just pulled a muscle and maybe hadn’t eaten enough.”
The couple went for something to eat on their way home but Shona’s symptoms got progressively got worse. She said: “I went home and went for a nap and woke up and the room was spinning 360. I was screaming for John to come through. I felt sick and I couldn’t swallow properly and and the right side was numb.”
The couple called NHS24 and were advised to go to an out of hours clinic.
Shona said: “I was seen quite quickly and a nurse thought I had stroke symptoms. However, a doctor said, I was so young it didn’t make it sense. Then I started projectile vomiting and they took it seriously and I was sent to the Western.”
Shona was sent for a battery of tests but it took three days before doctors realised she had suffered a stroke, on account of her age.
It transpired that she had torn an artery in her neck which had cut of the blood supply to her brain, which is known as arterial dissection.
Only around three per cent of stroke cases are those under the age of 45.
Shona said: “When I was taken down to the stroke unit, they apologised and said they were sorry it hadn’t been found earlier.
“When I fell I tore my artery and the blood couldn’t get through. It’s just a one in a million chance of something happening and it did.
“In a way, I think I was lucky but four years later, I still feel unlucky that it happened. I can’t even watch snowboarding on TV now.”
The couple are expecting their first child in mid December and Shona will require a caesarian section because she has scar tissue in the artery in her neck but she counts herself lucky that she hasn’t suffered any long term symptoms.
She said: “It was big part of my brain that was affected but the consultant said youth and health were on my side and that’s why I recovered so quickly.”
Shona’s husband John, an engineer, is running the Great Scottish Run10k on September 30 to raise funds for the charity, Chest, Heart, Stroke Scotland.
Shona said: “I had stroke symptoms and it’s about making people aware that if you are experiencing them, go to hospital.”
To sponsor John go to www.justgiving.com/fundraising/john-storr3
‘‘ It’s just one in a million chance of something happening and it did