RARE, TERRIFYING AND TOUGH TO SPOT

After a long struggle, Michelle, 33, whose one-in-a-million case is the subject of medical paper, has rebuilt her life to become the mum she wanted to be.

She said: “Giving birth should have been the most memorable moment of my life.

“Instead everything was a confused jumble. I was distraught, I couldn’t even recognise my husband Brent or the twins’ faces properly.

“It was so scary. I was in intensive care terrified something had happened to them, but I couldn’t even picture them.”

It was two days before Michelle started to remember Brent, who was slowly re-introduced to her by doctors.

He was also terrified, fearing he’d never get his wife back. He said: “She was just looking at me blankly like a stranger. I had two tiny babies to look after.

“I spent my days running between the maternity unit and intensive care.”

Michelle, a primary school teacher of Shrewsbury, Shropshire, is talking about her ordeal for the first time to help other victims of her condition – posterior reversible encephalopathy syndrome.

She had a normally pregnancy and was induced at 37 weeks. She gave birth to Lexi, weighing 4lb, and Sam, at 5lb 13oz, in the early hours of September 20, 2011.

Within hours she had a crushing headache and later collapsed. Her blood THE disturbing condition that caused ructions in the lives of Michelle Varley and her family is mercifully rare.

Posterior reversible encephalopathy syndrome has links to hypertension – high blood pressure – and postpregnancy eclampsia.

Victims suffer headaches, confusion, visual loss and seizures. Magnetic resonance imaging scans of the brain will show areas of swelling in patients. If promptly recognised and treated, the syndrome can resolve within days to weeks. There has been little research into the condition and it is unknown how many cases there have been over the years.

But with increasing awareness and use of MRI more diagnoses may be made in the future. Keith Reed, chief executive of the charity Twins and Multiple Births Association, said what the family had been through a really lly tough experience.

He said: “Their story is one of bravery and struggle in the most difficult of situations.” Tamba runs a Twinline support line ne for families and last year volunteers received more than 9,000 hours of calls.