Game Of Thrones star Emilia Clarke has shared candid snaps from the hospital during her recovering from her first brain aneurysm.
The actress was just 24 and had just finished filming the first series of the hit fantasy show when suffered a devastating brain haemorrhage that left her in intensive care.
She's now shared previously unseen pictures from her time in hospital, with one snap showing tubes coming out of her head.
Emilia, now 32, showed the images during an interview on America's CBS Sunday Morning, and spoke openly about how she bounced back from the ordeal.
She was diagnosed with a subarachnoid hemorrhage (SAH), a life-threatening type of stroke, which was caused by a brain aneurysm.
After spending five days in intensive care, Emilia managed to recover and go back to work, but had to undergo a second brain surgery in 2013, which failed and she suffered a brain bleed that nearly killed her.
Game Of Thrones star Emilia Clarke nearly died after suffering major stroke at 24
It meant she had to go under the knife for a third time for another life-saving operation.
Emilia survived by she says that she lost hope after the second brain bleed.
She told CBS Sunday Morning: "The first time it was difficult, with the second one I found it much harder to stay optimistic.
"[I coped with it as a] a day to day thing. I definitely went through a period of being... down - putting it mildly....
"In my worst moments, I wanted to pull the plug. I asked the medical staff to let me die. My job - my entire dream of what my life would be- centred on language, on communication. Without that, I was lost."
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However, she managed to recover and felt that going back to Game of Thrones to play warrior queen Daenerys Targaryen helped put her back in a more positive frame of mind.
She explained: "You go on the set, and you play a badass character, and you walk through fire, and you speak to hundreds of people, and you're being asked to be – to work as hard as you possibly can.
"And that became the thing that just saved me from considering my own mortality, yeah."
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