a Colorado A martial artist suffered a devastating stroke while training in Brazilian jiu-jitsu, underscoring the mysterious rise of this devastating medical condition among young, healthy Americans.
In January, Jo Beckwith, 32, trained for a competition. She trained every day and was in top condition.
One day during sparring, something happened that put her life at risk.
“About a minute later, out of nowhere, I felt like a baseball bat had hit the back of my skull. I was on the ground for the rest of the day and night,” the influencer said.
‘The word “vertigo” doesn’t seem to describe how dizzy I was, how completely unable to even open my eyes, or even lift my head. I couldn’t even string words together. My whole body was shaking and I couldn’t stop it.
“Nobody had any idea what was happening. It was bad, and it was really scary,” she added.
Jo Beckwith, 32, was training for a Brazilian jiu-jitsu match when she “felt like a baseball bat had hit the back of her skull.” She had suffered a stroke
Ms. Beckwith is one of nearly 800,000 Americans who suffer a stroke each year. Her stroke occurred near her cerebellum and occipital lobe, which control coordination, motor skills and vision.
It would be more than an hour before Mrs. Beckwith could sit up and speak a few words. As she was being driven home, she stumbled before she reached the front door.
“I was fine, but I also just couldn’t think straight,” she said.
Mrs. Beckwith did not realize she was having a stroke. She thought she had gone too far with her practice and needed rest.
And like many young people who suffer a stroke, she chose not to go to the hospital.
For two days she suffered from severe headaches and neck pain and had difficulty moving her hands.
But she’s lucky to be alive: Every minute a stroke goes untreated, nearly 2 million brain cells die, leading to irreversible brain damage and death.
According to the CDC, Beckwith is one of the 800,000 Americans who suffer a stroke each year, or one person every 40 seconds.
The most common cause of death is an increasing number of young people. Experts are doing everything they can to find out the cause.
Some officials have suggested the rise could be due to increases in obesity, high blood pressure and drug addiction, all of which increase the risk of stroke.
Others believe that young people are more sensitive to stress and therefore more vulnerable.
After two days of debilitating pain, Mrs Beckwith went to hospital. Tests revealed a tear in her vertebral artery, one of the main blood supplies to the brain and spine.
This led to the blood flow from that artery to the back of her brain becoming blocked, causing a stroke in her cerebellum and occipital lobe. As cells in these areas died, Mrs. Beckwith could no longer walk, talk, or even hold a pencil.
Doctors suspect that her neck was damaged by a blow during the sparring session, which ruptured an artery, leading to a stroke.
“Everything happened really fast,” Ms. Beckwith said in a video on her Youtube Channel.
The CDC report found that the number of strokes in people ages 18 to 64 increased by about 15 percent, when comparing the number of strokes from 2011-2013 to the number of strokes from 2020-2022.
After her injury, Ms. Beckwith had to give up jiu-jitsu altogether. “It was a big part of my identity,” she said
She spent several days in intensive care before being discharged.
“For the next three months I wasn’t allowed to do anything,” she said.
Once a fitness fanatic who took part in intense sports like jiu-jitsu, Mrs. Beckwith was allowed only short, supervised walks and nothing heavier than a gallon of milk. Even her 90-pound dog, Leo, had to be housed elsewhere for two months.
Mrs. Beckwith, who had had her foot amputated five years earlier, was again experiencing a familiar trauma. She was confined to bed and could find no solace in her hobbies.
It’s unclear whether Beckwith’s leg amputation had anything to do with her stroke, but experts believe it may increase her risk of heart problems such as stroke and heart failure.
a higher education For example, research in South Korea found that patients who had undergone an amputation were at greater risk of atrial fibrillation (an irregular heartbeat) and heart attack.
This may be because amputation increases resting heart rate and blood pressure and can narrow blood vessels.
“I had to keep reminding myself that everything is temporary. Being stuck at home without all the tools I normally use to get through things was really hard,” Ms. Beckwith said.
“But I’ve been trying to get better. I think it took me at least three months to think, ‘I think I feel like a person.'”
A recent CDC report found that the number of strokes in patients under age 45 has increased by nearly 15 percent, and the number of strokes in patients between ages 45 and 64 has increased by 16 percent.
The report also found that people who had not completed high school had the greatest increase in strokes, up 18.2 percent.
Although the risk of stroke in someone under 45 is still low, a number of lifestyle factors can increase the chance.
A small investigation in the Journal of Applied Psychology It has been suggested that vaping causes problems in regulating blood flow to the brain, although the mechanism for this was not clear.
If a person has one stroke, he or she is also more vulnerable to a second one.
In May, just as Mrs. Beckwith was beginning to regain some of her strength, she woke in the middle of the night with a strange feeling: “All of a sudden, the same feeling I had when I had the stroke came back, going from 0 to 60.”
Mrs. Beckwith had difficulty keeping her balance and could barely speak. She lost control of half her body.
She thought her worst nightmare was coming true: that she would have another stroke.
Ms. Beckwith is now focusing on recovery and finding other ways to stay active, such as dancing
However, doctors believe Ms Beckwith had a hemiplegic migraine, a rare form of migraine that affects one in every 100 migraine sufferers and resembles symptoms of a stroke, such as weakness and difficulty speaking.
She is now slowly getting fit again, although she had to stop jiu-jitsu to reduce the risk of another stroke.
“I’m doing a lot better. I’m not 100 percent yet — I didn’t expect to be — and I have no idea when or if that’s going to happen,” she said.
“I don’t think I’m ready to accept…how this has changed my life, my daily experiences, and my health.”
She added: ‘If I have any interest in staying alive, I can never do jiu-jitsu again. It was a huge part of my identity… I’ve never found a sport that made me feel so free, especially after I lost my leg. That’s the only place in the world where I don’t feel disabled.’
However, Mrs Beckwith is now trying other, less intense sports, such as dancing, to stay active while she recovers.
“While I’m grieving loss, I also enjoy discovering new things,” she said.