Three years ago, a young teacher was adjusting to the new COVID normal of educating her kids via Zoom while trying to maintain her fit and healthy lifestyle.
But, in May 2020, Courtney Rubie’s life changed in a way that she never expected.
“It began with a really sudden headache – the worst headache of my life. And I just thought that perhaps I had some sort of migraine,” she told news.com.au.
Courtney explained that she chalked it up to suddenly being in front of her computer more due to the shift to online learning.
“But then as the day went on, I started feeling really nauseous. I felt quite dizzy. So I just kept trying to rest and just keep up my fluids,” she said.
However, her symptoms carried on to the next day, when she woke up and her arm was completely numb.
She explained that it felt like it was completely detached from her body.
Her bizarre symptoms led her to go to the hospital, where they looked into possible causes of what may be going on.
Everyone, including Courtney, dismissed that it was a stroke because of the unusual symptoms she was showing.
But, before she was about to be discharged from the hospital, the now 28-year-old began to have seizures.
She was taken to have a lumbar puncture, before suffering another seizure during the procedure so she was taken for a CT scan.
A neurologist confirmed she’d had a serious of strokes, meaning she was part of the 40 per cent of Australians who had no idea they’d had one.
“When the neurologist had said ‘You’ve had strokes’ I don’t really remember what he said because I felt like my entire being fell out of my body,” she said.
“It didn’t feel like real life, and I thought to myself’ OK the dream can stop now, this is really weird.”
Her parents were with her when the doctor delivered the life-altering news and was able to contact her school to let them know Courtney would be out of action.
However, COVID restrictions meant that other loved ones, including her best friend, weren’t allowed to visit her which made her feel incredibly isolated during the entire experience.
The Newcastle woman said she was in the hospital for 10 days before she was allowed to return home, where she rested a lot as part of her recovery.
She added that it was bizarre going from one extreme – teaching full-time, socializing and going to the gym – to being completely stagnant.
Three years on, she is still dealing with the ongoing impact of what her stroke did to her.
“The thing that was the most difficult to manage, and something that I still manage, is the ongoing fatigue, brain fog and trying to accept that,” she said.
“My daily battery is different to what it was prior to having a stroke. Like there’s a lot, there’s a lot of mental work that goes into when you’re young like you’re 25 and you’re doing everything to not being able to do a lot of that anymore.
“Like there’s like a real grieving process for your old self and that person and how they fit into a new normal.”
The Economic Impact of Stroke report, released in 2020 by The Stroke Foundation, showed that a stroke occurred every 19 minutes.
While the number of strokes in Australia is decreasing, there is an increase in Australians having strokes at a younger age, particularly among those aged 35 to 54.
Courtney wants young people to be aware that this isn’t an issue that solely retirees face.
“When I was on the stroke ward, everyone around me was at least twice my age. I was the youngest person on the ward,” she said.
“I was humbled one day, when a medical staffer had walked past me and she asked me how old I was. A
”W had a conversation about what happened and she said; “You look like the youngest person here but maybe in a few weeks, there’ll be someone in a very similar age bracket to you here’.”
She said young people suffering strokes happened much more than society may think.
FAST is an acronym that helps identify a stroke. It stands for. Facial drooping, Arm weakness, Speech difficulties and Time to call emergency services.