Much like her iconic character Daenerys Targaryen, Emilia Clarke has faced her own formidable battles.
Emilia Clarke chose the term "battle" herself in a poignant first-person piece published in March for the New Yorker. she courageously shared her experience of suffering two aneurysms after the first season of Game of Thrones, which aired in early 2011. In a recent interview on the BBC One program Sunday Morning, Clarke revisited this harrowing chapter of her life with a sense of astonishment, candidly revealing that she lacks "quite a bit" of her brain.
She humorously mused, "With the amount of brain that I am disabled, it is incredible that I am able to speak, sometimes articulately, and live my life completely normally with absolutely no repercussions."
Clarke went on to express the rare nature of her survival: "I belong to a very, very, very small minority of people who survive that. There's a lot of [brain] missing! Sometimes it even makes me laugh. In strokes, basically, as soon as any part of the brain doesn't get blood for a second, it goes away. And so the blood finds a different route to move, but then whatever is missing disappears."
In her 2019 article, the actress detailed the immense stress she faced after becoming famous overnight with the success of Game of Thrones. She transitioned from relative obscurity to becoming one of the most recognizable faces on television. Clarke grappled with this newfound fame, not fully understanding how to navigate this unfamiliar territory. She confided, "I was terrified. Terrified of the attention, of a business she barely understood, of honoring the trust the creators of Game of Thrones had placed in me. I felt, in every way, exposed. In the first episode I appeared N-, and from then on, I always asked myself the same question: 'You play a strong woman and yet you take off your clothes.
Why? How many men must I kill to prove my worth?'"
This existential crisis was exacerbated by her realization that she had become a role model for young girls, many of whom dressed as Daenerys in platinum wigs and robes.
Her battle with her health began during a workout session with a personal trainer when she suddenly experienced severe head pressure. Minutes later, she lost consciousness in her locker room. As Clarke recounted, "A cloud of unconsciousness settled over me. Because no one knew what was wrong with me, the doctors and nurses couldn't give me medication to relieve the pain. Finally, I had an MRI, a brain scan. The diagnosis came quickly and ominously: a subarachnoid hemorrhage (SAH), a type of life-threatening stroke caused by bleeding into the space around the brain. I had an aneurysm, an arterial rupture." This necessitated her first operation.
In the same article and subsequent interviews, Clarke disclosed that her most terrifying moment was experiencing aphasia, a language disorder characterized by the inability or difficulty in verbal communication. She remembered, "From my mouth, words that made no sense came out, and I panicked. I had never experienced fear like that. I could see my life passing me by, and it wasn't worth living. 'I am an actress; I need to remember my lines, and now I couldn't even remember my name.'"
Fortunately, the medical team intervened in time, allowing her to recover before filming the second season of Game of Thrones. Clarke recalled, "It was like: 'Really, it's something very small, I'm fine.' And yes, I was really much better; six weeks later, I was on set." However, two years later, she was diagnosed with another aneurysm, necessitating a second surgery. While the recovery from her first operation was challenging, the second was considerably tougher. Clarke confessed, "I went through a period of being very low, to be honest, but you get to the set, and you have to play this huge woman, and you have to go through fire. I think that saved me from dwelling on my mortality."
Since then, Emilia Clarke has not only continued her acting career but also embarked on philanthropic endeavors through her charity, Same You. The charity's mission is to provide treatment for people recovering from brain injuries in both the United Kingdom and the United States. Clarke's journey of resilience and her commitment to helping others serve as an inspiration to us all.
