A feeling of nausea in August last year was the first sign the fit and healthy 35-year-old had that something wasn’t right.

PART ONE: From Maroons legend to McDonald’s baron

PART TWO: Maroons great goes from player to QLD women’s coach

It wasn’t until the team arrived in Brisbane for a short stopover between flights home from a game in Newcastle he realised he couldn’t walk.

Scott told The Sunday Mail he counts himself lucky to be healthy, happy and enjoying the challenges of a new business – but that doesn’t mean the road back has been easy.

Scott has had lengthy recovery process, which continues, and the shock setback has meant all his post-retirement plans were changed.

THE DAY MATT’S LIFE CHANGED

Premiership-winning captain Matt Scott announced his retirement from the NRL on July 19 last year.

It wasn’t going to be a fairytale finish for the star forward, with the Cowboys already looking to be finals outsiders with nine losses and seven wins under their belts.

But even so, Scott never expected his glittering career to end the way it did.

Just over a month later, he was lying in a hospital bed in Brisbane as doctors delivered the news he had suffered a stroke.

He wouldn’t get to farewell the game on his terms. His NRL career was over.

The news rocked the rugby league world, with Scott’s stroke occurring the morning after a Cowboys game against the Knights.

The team were in Newcastle and to this day, the 35-year-old remembers the confusion around his condition when he woke up vomiting on August 18.

“The biggest thing I remember was being nauseous,” Scott said of the day he suffered his stroke.

“I couldn’t stop throwing up, I was dizzy. The world was spinning and I couldn’t see straight or walk straight. I actually couldn’t walk at all at one stage.

“I was rooming with (teammate) Scott Bolton and he could tell there was something wrong. We’d had a couple drinks the night before but it was nothing crazy. He knew it couldn’t be the cause.

“I sat next to him on the plane and he could see something was really wrong.”

To add to Scott’s pain, the Cowboys were due to travel that day from Newcastle all the way home to Townsville, with a stopover in Brisbane.

He made it onto the flight to Brisbane, but couldn’t go any further from there.

“By the time we landed in Brisbane, that’s when I couldn’t really walk,” he said.

“I couldn’t really open my eyes and I couldn’t stop throwing up. From then on it was just into hospital and there were lots of questions. We actually didn’t find out what the cause was for another 24 hours.”

North Queensland’s team doctor went with Scott to the hospital before his former teammate and the club’s Chief Operating Officer, Michael Luck, flew down to stay the night.

Once they learned he’d had a stroke, Scott’s pregnant wife Lauren then made the trip to Brisbane to be with her husband.

The news came as a shock to Scott, his family, and his team.

He was discharged from hospital by September 4, but it was going to be a long road ahead to return to full health.

He admitted it was hard to understand why it happened and even harder when reality hit that his playing career was over.

“The challenging part was that I played NRL the day before and I was fit, strong and healthy,” he said.

“Then I couldn’t stand up or walk. I could hardly open my eyes for a few days because I was so dizzy. I just wanted to get home but I didn’t really know how slow and hard the recovery was.

“It was difficult just not being with my teammates. I remember I had to watch one game from the hospital bed and the last game we played (in Townsville) the club did a nice send off for me.

“They had my family at the game and the boys got to walk on with Lauren and my jersey. That was the night I really realised it was the end.

“It was pretty hard to watch. I was too sick to even go to the game. It was also Scott Bolton’s last game so missing out on that and the celebrations for the year ending, that was pretty tough.”

By North Queensland’s final game on September 6, Scott had officially retired.

He finished with an incredible resume – 268 NRL games as a one-club player, 22 appearances for the mighty Maroons and another 22 matches in the green and gold of Australia.

He is considered the greatest forward to ever wear a North Queensland jersey and had endured many highs and lows across his career.

But some of the best and worst was still to come for Scott in his first year of retirement.

ROAD TO RECOVERY

While Scott left Brisbane knowing he had suffered a stroke, the one thing doctors could not tell him was the cause.

He is still unsure of why it happened, but knows rugby league could have been a contributing factor.

“They couldn’t say exactly what the cause was,” he said.

“All my tests came back clear.

“I did get a pretty bad head knock during the game and doctors thought that very well could have contributed to the stroke but couldn’t say that was definitely what caused it.

“It could have just been the timing. It’s really hard to pick exactly what the cause was.”

But what Scott did know is he had a tough recovery ahead.

Unlike the injuries he had copped across his 15 years in the game, this recovery didn’t have a clear, set plan.

“The first few months were really hard,” he said.

“It’s not a physical injury where I knew exactly what I had to do and I could rehab it and I had a time frame. When I had those (football) injuries, I could always push that physical recovery.

“But with this, I was trying to manage being patient and not letting it worry me too much and just trying to do my recovery each day to try to get better.

“There were some days where I couldn’t do anything but I had to try to stay positive and keep going, which is completely different to how I treated my injuries.

“It was easily the most difficult thing I’ve done.”

Over a year later and Scott still has some lasting symptoms of his stroke.

But he is in a much happier and healthier place, both physically and mentally.

“It feels like such a long time ago now but it’s only been in the last six months where I have got to a point where I feel pretty good most days,” he said.

“I am used to what life’s like now.

“I have a couple of symptoms that are specific to my type of stroke. I have limited feeling down the left side of my body but still have full function, which is lucky.

“I still get a bit of dizziness, blurred vision and a bit of fatigue, which is a pretty common symptom in stroke recovery. But it’s at a pretty good level now where I can manage it.”

The greatest gifts for Scott have been the support of his family and friends, the birth of his daughter and the way he’s been able to land on his feet in his new careers.

Scott and his wife Lauren already had two sons – Hugo, 6, and Wil, 3 – when they welcomed their baby girl, Freya, last December.

“I’ve been able to spend a lot of time with my family and that was definitely a positive,” Scott said of the past year.

“It’s been awesome. Having Freya has definitely brought out the softer side in me.

“She’s a lot more affectionate and has such a different personality to what the boys had.

“It was great to spend a lot of time with her when she was so little and really get to know her and build that relationship while she was so young.

“She’s really completed our little family and makes the whole house feel a lot better because she’s so beautiful and everyone loves her.”

And it is with family where Scott has found a new career as well.

While he still works with the Cowboys in a commercial role, he has also started a construction business with his brother, Adrian.

Aptly named Scott Brothers Construction, the company does rural construction and civil work between Longreach and Cloncurry in western Queensland.

While Adrian – a concreter and boilermaker by trade – is “on the tools” and spends most of the time working remotely, Scott runs the financial side, as well as the management and planning.

“With any problems in life, there’s always opportunities out of it,” he said.

“My brother and I had talked about it over the years and doing something like this with him is going to be a lot easier than doing something on my own.

“It’s going really well so far and maybe if I hadn’t had my stroke, I wouldn’t have done it.

“It’s been very interesting trying to learn about business and the construction industry. I don’t have any experience in either but I’ve been fortunate to meet some really good mentors through rugby league.”

Scott’s mantra throughout the past year has been to find the positives where he can.

And aside from spending more time with family and starting his business with his brother, he also counts himself lucky for the health he does have.

While he is still recovering, he knows he could have been worse off and is grateful to have what he has today.

“I’ve still got my health,” he said.

“It’s not where it was but there’s a lot of people that are a lot worse off … I know that some of the symptoms can be really hard to deal with.

“One thing with the stroke is, it’s given us that time to take stock of what we’ve got, what we’ve been able to achieve over my career and all the good things we’ve been able to do because of rugby league and my career.

“We as a family got to reflect on that. I’m very thankful with the position I was in when I did have my stroke, financially and also personally, with my relationships and family.

“If you don’t have that support it could have been really difficult.”

LOOKING BACK

While Scott didn’t get to finish his career on his own terms, he still has many fond memories of his time in rugby league, particularly in the Origin arena.

He counts his 2015 NRL premiership victory with the Cowboys as the “top of the tree” when it comes to his career achievements, but Scott also played a crucial part in the famous Queensland Maroons dynasty.

Scott made his Queensland debut in 2006 – when the incredible run under coach Mal Meninga started – and played 22 Origin games over the following decade.

He said his favourite memory is of the cleansweep in 2010.

“Apart from my debut, I’d have to say 2010 (is a favourite memory) … it was a great year,” he said.

“That was my first full series back in the squad and I’d played in the last game in 2009 when we lost. We were a bit disappointed with that.

“We came into 2010 and had a really good mindset and managed a cleansweep, which hadn’t been done for quite a while. That was one of the best moments.

“It still amazes me that I got to be a part of (the dynasty). I feel very privileged and proud to have been part of such a dominant and great time in Maroons history.

“It’s probably something that I’ll always look back on and be proud of and have really good memories about.”

Given how his career ended last year, Scott – FOG No. 155 – said he hasn’t really sat back to reflect on his time in rugby league or remember his last games for the Cowboys, Maroons and Australian Kangaroos.

However, he knows he has no regrets.

He said it’s hard to not know when your final game is going to be, but that’s why he played every game in the Maroon jumper like it was his last.

“I was so happy with what I managed to do within the Origin arena and to be a part of it,” he said.

“It’s not like I have any regrets at all. It’s disappointing that I didn’t get a chance to make my farewell a bit more special but in saying that I treated every Origin game like it was my last.”