A man who has been left paralysed following two strokes has married the love of his life just two weeks after it happened.
Steven Brown, 39, from Gateshead, married Alyson Brown, 36, and she said she would always be by his side ‘in sickness and in health’.
Steven was told by a pharmacist in April that he had high blood pressure after he complained about blurred vision, intense pain, and dizziness.
He was taken to hospital after Alyson noticed his lip and eyes slanted and was told he had a cerebellar stroke.
Steven then had another stroke on June 13 of this year and shouted ‘this is it’ before he collapsed.
Alyson said: ‘I rang 999 and as I was on the phone to them, his breathing went really deep so I had to shout next door to the neighbour to help me put Steven on his side because his body had stiffened with the seizure.’
Following the operation friends and family felt positive but he soon developed locked-in syndrome.
This means that while he is still able to see and hear and has to communicate just through blinking – one blink for no, two for yes.
It is caused when there is a complete paralysis of voluntary muscles except for the ones that control eye movement.
It got so bad for Steven that at one point he felt like ending his own life.
‘(I had) the realisation that I’m never going to get him home to our home, and also not wanting to go to our home because it’s where I saw him so poorly and I thought I lost him that day,’ Alyson said.
She was still determined to marry Steven and staff asked him whether he still wanted to marry her to which he gave two blinks.
Before the big day Steven’s friends held him a stag do in the hospital room where they watched an England Euros match.
‘(The hospital staff) got flowers for us and they got a wedding cake for us and they lined up and down the corridors,’ Alyson said.
‘The hospital staff decorated the room and used pillowcases on the chairs and stuff like that, they had been really creative, and all of his friends and family all wore Newcastle tops.
‘His son Rocco was his best man and obviously Steven wasn’t able to put the ring on my finger so his son did it for him which was super emotional.
‘We were able to forget, just for one day, and it just really expressed the meaning of marriage. I couldn’t see anyone else in the room.
‘Everyone said he lit up and his eyes were open when I came in the room and mine did too, and for that moment we had it was really special, and I wouldn’t normally say that about something, but it was actually quite magical.’
The pair met on Tinder and got engaged in August 2023 and Alyson wants to warn others about the warning signs.
She hopes one day the pair can celebrate properly in the wedding venue they booked and said: ‘It’s still there in the hope that we still get to do that as well,’ as Steven receives physical therapy.
A GoFundMe page has been set up for him and donations can be made here.
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