Broadcaster Mark Cagney has revealed he suffered two strokes and lost a quarter of his sight.
The 64-year-old said he feels “incredibly lucky” to be alive.
He suffered from depression and anxiety for weeks following his diagnosis, adding: “You become aware that strokes don’t tend to be singular events... so you are aware that it can happen again,” he told Newstalk’s The Hard Shoulder.
“So when you put that together with your worst fears of what has already happened you don’t think ‘what if?’ you think ‘when will it happen again?’”
The presenter said he had none of the common signs of having a stroke such as a drooping face or numbness and loss of feelings in his limbs.
Cagney revealed that he had no idea he had suffered two strokes earlier this year until he had MRI scans.
He recalled how on January 8 the first thing he felt was “a really strange buzzing, kind of white noise, in my head”.
Cagney also described how he started having problems with his vision behind the wheel of his car on the way to the supermarket and his “spatial awareness” had deserted him.
The former TV presenter said he noticed his symptoms deteriorate further and get serious was while he was speaking to a shop assistant.
“I said, ‘thank you very much’ and turned to walk away and then the room just went completely 180 degrees on me,” he said. “Bang, I blacked out, collapsed, dropped.
“I didn’t topple but I went straight down on my knees and the next thing I remember is a man leaning over me saying, ‘are you alright, are you having chest pains.
“I said, no it’s not that. I know what heart attack protocols are, it’s not that, it is in my head."
Cagney’s daughter collected him and they drove home where he later collapsed for a second time, which medics believe was his second stroke.
The broadcaster went to Beaumont Hospital where he said he was pleasantly surprised he was seen by medics in three hours and he had a bed within six.
“The following morning they came in and said ‘you had a pulmonary embolism’, which is a clot in your lung, and I thought ‘okay, it could’ve been worse- but why am I in a stroke ward?’
“He said, ‘because what you described to us does not compute with what we have seen so far.’
“Then they did brain MRIs and they discovered I had had a stroke and possibly two strokes.”
