IT was "like a flick of a switch".
Adam Henderson had felt fine when he woke up on the day of his stroke in November 2022.
He was just 23 at the time and the vehicle maintenance worker, from Broxburn in West Lothian, had driven himself to a hairdresser appointment and sat in the car speaking to his girlfriend for 10 minutes.
"I didn't feel poorly when I woke up, I felt completely fine. But as soon as I closed the car door it was like a flick of a switch, it was strange."
READ MORE: Concern over 'alarming' dip in care for stroke patient on NHS Scotland
Moments later, as he stepped into the hairdresser's, his speech was garbled.
"In my head I was answering them, but later on I found out that I was just grunting at them - I wasn't actually speaking.
"They thought I was on something, that I'd been out the night before, but it got worse and worse so they phoned my partner and she phoned her mum because her mum is a nurse.
"Her mum came up [to the hairdresser's] straightaway and she knew what was going on immediately."
READ MORE: Anger as Scot Govt slashes planned thrombectomy funding
After being driven to St John's hospital in Livingston, where he was diagnosed with a stroke following a swallow screen, Mr Henderson was rushed by ambulance to the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh.
By this time he could neither speak nor walk.
A CT scan identified ischaemic stroke - the most common form, caused by a blood clot - and he was taken into theatre for an emergency thrombectomy.
"The procedure took about 20 minutes, and within 10 minutes of coming round, my speech and movement had returned," said Mr Henderson, who was one of just 112 stroke patients to receive the procedure in Scotland last year.
In total, from being picked up at the hairdresser to leaving theatre, took two hours 22 minutes.
READ MORE: 'I was too young to have a stroke - it was scary'
Now 24, Mr Henderson is back to playing football and going to the gym.
The only residual evidence of the trauma is some difficulty with spelling and an occasional stutter.
He said: "Recently I've been struggling to spell basic words - I think my brain just needs a little rest. I am still healing.
"My right hand twitches a little bit, but if I hadn't had the thrombectomy I could have been a lot worse off.
"It is a terrifying thing to happen - I didn't know anything about a stroke. I feel like it is something people should be a lot more clued up on.
"Now I keep seeing people who've obviously had a stroke and I can tell that they haven't been able to get the right treatment on time.
"They're in wheelchairs or they're having to be helped to do other things - it is quite scary."
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