“I remember thinking, ‘Who is that talking?'”
On 4 May, Althia Bryden was found in her bed unresponsive, her face drooping on the right side.
The 58-year-old from Highbury, north London was taken to hospital and diagnosed with a stroke.
The stroke left her unable to speak and unable to feel the upper-right side of her body.
Doctors discovered a carotid web in her neck — a rare, shelf-like formation that can disrupt blood flow to the brain.
They removed it in surgery in August.
The next day in intensive care a nurse woke her to take her blood pressure, and, “completely out of the blue, I just started speaking”, she says.
“She looked as shocked as I did. The nurse rushed to get colleagues round to my bed. No-one could believe I was talking after so long,”
Medical staff immediately noticed something odd about her speech.
They asked if she had spoken with an Italian accent before the stroke and told her she now had a strong accent.
“In the whirlwind of it all, I was so confused,” she says.
Althia, a medically retired customer service advisor and grandmother, says she has never spoken Italian nor visited Italy.
Yet she now speaks with a distinct accent and sometimes slips into expressions such as “mamma mia”, “bambino” and “si” without realising it.
“Before, I didn’t sound like the Queen, but I sounded British. I’ve always lived in London, but all my family are from Jamaica,” she explains.
She is awaiting a formal diagnosis, but her speech and language therapist has suggested she has foreign accent syndrome
The condition — described by health bodies such as the NHS / HRA — is where a person’s speech takes on an accent perceived as foreign, usually after brain injury such as a stroke.
“Doctors and nurses saw me as a bit of a medical marvel – none of the nurses, doctors, therapists or surgeons had dealt with foreign accent syndrome in their whole careers,” Althia says.
“This is when I realised just how rare this condition is. I wish more people knew about it.”
“I don’t know who I am”
Although she feels lucky to be alive, Althia says the change to her voice has left her feeling she has lost her identity.
She says she has no control over the sounds she now produces.
“Even my laugh is not the same… I’m not me. I feel like a clown with an upside-down smile that people are watching perform.
“It’s very sad – everything is different, even my body language is different. People aren’t meeting the original me, I don’t know who I am,” she adds.
Each morning Althia wakes hoping the accent will have gone, but clinicians cannot say whether her original voice will return.
“I’m still looking for the person I was before,” she says.
“Where do I go to find the button to switch this stuff off?”
Since her stroke she has received support from the Stroke Association, including home visits from a coordinator and attendance at support groups.
Those services have helped her accept that foreign accent syndrome is part of her story.
“It made me realise having foreign accent syndrome is part of my story, and I shouldn’t be ashamed,” Althia says.
She has not yet met anyone else who has had the same experience, which often leaves her feeling isolated.
“I want to meet someone with it, and be able to relate to someone and have that connection.”