I WAS LOCKED IN MY OWN BODY
STROKE AGED 25
When she first came to, everything felt odd and strangely fuzzy for Jasmine West.
The last thing she could remember clearly was fainting at work and then crawling into bed once she got home.
As she drifted in and out of deliriousness, a doctor appeared and revealed the devastating news – the fit and healthy 25-year-old from Victoria had suffered a major stroke.
But the horror didn’t end there. Jasmine realised she couldn’t move. She tried to call for help, but found she couldn’t talk either. The only thing she could do was blink.
‘It was torture. All I could do was cry,’ she tells New Idea in an exclusive interview.
Jasmine – who loved running, playing hockey and pole dancing – had developed locked-in syndrome as a result of the massive stroke.
It meant her body was completely paralysed, while her mind remained functioning perfectly. Doctors were unable to tell her what her future held.
‘I worried my days were over,’ Jasmine recalls.
Despite the bleak outlook, Jasmine’s boyfriend Rhys was unwavering in his support, spending every moment possible by her bedside.
Rhys had realised something was seriously wrong with Jasmine when she woke in the middle of the night vomiting in July 2016. She couldn’t walk, so he carried her to the car and drove her to Warrnambool Base Hospital.
Jasmine underwent 12 hours of testing before she was airlifted to St Vincent’s Hospital in Melbourne.
There, an emergency MRI revealed she had suffered a major stroke. She was placed on life support for four weeks and given a tracheostomy to help her breathe and swallow.
There had been absolutely no warning signs, and doctors were mystified as to the cause. Jasmine says the mental anguish was unbearable.
‘I kept thinking: “Why me?”’ she admits. ‘Would I ever play hockey again? Throw a ball for my dogs, Bonnie and Clyde? I worried I’d never walk or talk again. Or eat. It felt like my body was a prison.’
And Jasmine loathed the tube put down her windpipe through the incision in her neck.
‘I could feel it was there. It was pretty gross. I just wanted to rip it out, but I couldn’t.’
The hardest part for Jasmine was not being able to communicate and the feeling of frustration was totally overwhelming for her.
‘I remember one night, my feet were squashed and they were causing pain, but I couldn’t tell the nurses. I was just crying.’
The minutes stretched like hours and the only thing Jasmine could do to pass the time was watch TV as her beloved Rhys went off to work during the week. However, he made the three and a half hour drive to see Jasmine every weekend.
‘Rhys would talk to me like normal. He was positive.
‘He would show me videos of the dogs. He told me he loved me and I knew we would get through this no matter what.
‘But I also felt guilty because I didn’t want him to give up his life to potentially care for me.’
For someone who had once been so physically active, Jasmine says her predicament was ‘devastating’.
But she was resolute in her determination to get better.
‘I kept telling myself I’m not going to be like this forever. I’ve always been very stubborn. I was determined to get my independence again – I wasn’t going to let anyone care for me,’ she says.
At the start, the only way Jasmine could communicate was by blinking – one short blink for yes, one long blink for no.
But after a couple of weeks, she began to regain some movement in her fingers and arms. It was such a huge breakthrough for her, as it meant she could start to communicate through an alphabet board, spelling out words by pointing.
‘They also had some phrases on there and I would point to the emotion I was feeling.’
Jasmine had some intense physiotherapy sessions and gradually, she began to regain movement in the rest of her body. However, her right side was much weaker.
‘I had to relearn everything – how to roll over again, stand and sit. How to dress myself with a lack of movement in one arm and often getting myself stuck in clothes.’
Jasmine’s persistence paid off – within two months she had taken her first steps with the aid of a walker.
‘I walked over to my chair and everyone was watching. I couldn’t talk at that time so I just started crying because I was so happy.’
Things gradually progressed – and from small phrases, Jasmine learned to speak again.
Five months after she’d had her stroke, she was discharged from hospital.
Two years on, the inspiring 27-year-old is sharing her story to raise awareness of strokes in young people and to thank the staff at St Vincent’s Hospital who saved her life.
‘Without them I wouldn’t be alive and walking,’ she says.