Ex-Arts Minister Heidi Victoria issues stark warning after stroke
Former Victorian Arts Minister Heidi Victoria suffered a stroke at just 52. Now she is warning Victorians to be vigilant about their health and has revealed how she is fighting back.
Victoria
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Former Victorian Arts Minister, Heidi Victoria, has told of suffering a stroke in March.
Victoria, 52, who was the Member for Bayswater for 12 years until 2018, said her life changed on March 6 when she woke up feeling “like I had been hit by a truck.”
“I did not have a headache or anything but I did not feel connected. I went downstairs and I was a bit stumbly,” she said.
“I rang a friend and said ‘I don’t feel good’. And he said ‘stay where you are I am ringing an ambulance’. I said, ‘no I am OK’, and he said ‘no you are not, you can’t hear what I am hearing’ and he knew immediately I was having a stroke.
“I could move, but not well, and I could not pick up a cup or anything. In the ambulance on the way to hospital I remember they (the medics) were holding up pictures, they were line drawings and I knew one of them was a feather, but I could not tell them what it was. I could see what it was but I could not say it and I just burst into tears.”
Upon her arrival at hospital she was quickly sent for a CAT scan
“They said ‘yes, we can see it, you have had a stroke.’ They could see the clot and what it was doing to my brain,” Victoria said.
“They did what they had to do and admitted me to the ward.”
While her stay in hospital was brief and her speech quickly returned to normal, Victoria said she was exhausted for “weeks and weeks” following the episode.
A palsy on her face slowly subsided.
It was during this time she was diagnosed with a hole in her heart and underwent an operation to correct it in July.
“When the cardiologist gave me the diagnosis I could not believe what I was hearing. I said, ‘ I have just had a stroke. I don’t need a hole in the heart as well.’ It just seemed too much,” she said.
“But after all of that I am sitting here and I am talking and I am walking, I am as healthy as an ox and my brain, I think, has recovered extremely well.
“They can’t be definitive about what caused it and I am going to be on medication for the rest of my life.
“But I look at it all and say ‘how bloody lucky am I?’ I could be in a nursing home at the age of 52. I could be dead. I am so very lucky.”
Determined to put her frightening personal experience to good use, Victoria has joined the board of the Stroke Association of Victoria and is taking part in the Association’s virtual Will2Walk fundraiser.
She urged everyone, regardless of their age, to be proactive about their health and to educate themselves about the risk of strokes.
“A stroke can happen at any age. Babies can have them, teenagers can have them and obviously the older you get the more likely it is you could have them,” Victoria said.
“Lifestyle factors can play a part; people who smoke, are overweight, or who have high cholesterol.
“It is exactly the same as a heart attack, it just happens in another spot, it is effectively a brain attack.”
Victoria encouraged people to value and respect their health.
“Learn the signs and the risk factors and don’t imagine that it could never happen to you,” she said.
“And listen to your doctor, they are the expert, listen to them.”
visit will2walk-2020.raisely.com
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