Aubrey Plaza 'forgot how to talk' when she had stroke at age 20
Aubrey Plaza "forgot how to talk" when she had a stroke at the age of 20.
PHOTO: Instagram/Aubrey Plaza
PUBLISHED ONSeptember 12, 2024 2:36 AM
Aubrey Plaza "forgot how to talk" when she had a stroke at the age of 20.
The actress was briefly paralysed and lost her motor skills during the scary medical episode, which happened while she was "mid-sentence" chatting with a friend.
She told SiriusXM's Howard Stern: "It was wild. The craziest thing about it ― and kind the coolest thing about it ― it happened mid-sentence.
"I took the train to Astoria to have lunch with my friends and I walked into their apartment ― I hadn't even taken my jacket off ― and it just happened.
"That's when I was paralysed, but only really for a minute or something. I lost my motor skills really briefly.
"The freakiest thing was I forgot how to talk."
The 40-year-old actress previously admitted her friends initially thought she was joking when she had her stroke but she was eventually able to signal she needed help
She told NPR's Fresh Air: "I think [my friends] thought I was making a joke … I was always doing something stupid.
"But then after a couple of minutes, they kept saying, 'Do you want us to call an ambulance?' and I was aware enough to shake my head yes. I kept just shaking my head yes because I knew something was really, really wrong. But I didn't know what it was."
But when paramedics arrived, they didn't think Aubrey had had a stroke because of her age.
She added: "They were thinking that I was dehydrated. And I really think they thought I was on drugs because they kept asking me if I'd taken drugs, and I hadn't," she said at the time. "I hadn't really put anything into my body that day and — except for birth control."
She eventually met with a doctor and they realised what was wrong when she couldn't tell the difference between her left and right.
She reflected: "There was no recovery. I mean, when you have a stroke, you have a stroke.
"There's nothing you can do about it. Your brain has to heal itself. And that part of the blood clot area in my brain will never be healed.
"It's a tiny, little black hole in my brain. So I had some cognitive, you know, therapy that I went to. I went back to school in the fall."
Source: Bang
