accents

There's something universal about getting a kick out of speaking in foreign accents that differ from your own. Whether it's American friends putting on a fake British accent to talk about tea or an Australian speaking in a southern U.S. accent to order barbecue, it's all in good fun. But what is you woke up one day speaking in an accent that wasn't your own outside of your control?

This very thing happened to a British woman after suffering a stroke. It was just another day for Althia Bryden, she and her husband, Winston had settled in for the evening, propped up in bed to catch some television before going off to sleep. But things took a dramatic turn when her husband left the room for a few minutes only to return to Althia slumped over looking strangely.

Winston immediately knew that something wasn't right so he rushed her to the hospital where he found out that she had a stroke. The condition required her to have surgery to clear the blockage to her brain but when she awakened, she no longer recognized the voice coming from her mouth. This wasn't because her speech was slurred due to the stroke, it's because she was speaking in a completely different accent.

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Of course, Althia was thrilled to be speaking at all since she was unable to do so for a period of time after her stroke but it wasn't her accent. The woman who normally spoke with a familiar British accent was suddenly speaking with an Italian accent, except she's never spoken Italian. In fact, she's never even been to the boot shaped country on vacation, yet somehow she picked up the perfect Italian accent while under anesthesia.

Althia and her husband recently appeared on "This Morning," a morning news show in England, to tell the story of Althia's bizarre stroke side effect.

"i just remember to wake up into a ward but I didn't know why I was there, you know? Winston's telling me, my family's telling me I have a stroke. I wasn't sure where I was at the time and I didn't realize I had been taken from my house, from my bed, none of this. You know, a big surprise," Althia says in a thick Italian accent.

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The woman admits to the talk show hosts that it was a scary experience not being able to talk at first. The only thing she can do upon waking from her stroke was to point at things as a means of communication. She explains that she could hear and understand everything going on around her but she was unable to speak until after the surgery where they removed a carotid web. This is a rare thin membrane that can extend within the carotid artery blocking blood flow.

"The next day, you know, they moved me to a ward. The nurse comes to wake me to do blood pressure again, you know cause they're worried about it. So I hear this voice, I've not hear my voice for a long time, you know. I'm like this," Althia reenacts looking around the room. "I didn't realize it was me. I looked behind me in my hospital bed, who is speaking to me, you know. Who is this?"

Althia is one of only 200 or so people around the world who have Foreign Accent Syndrome. This rare condition can develop after damage to the area of your brain that controls speech, can develop without cause or occurring after a seizure or migraine according to the Cleveland Clinic. While the people who have the condition may sound as if they have a different accent, they don't actually have a "foreign" accent. That part of their brain has them forming words

"FAS involves sound changes that aren’t consistent with an accent. For example, accents that replace the “r” in “car” with an “ah” sound still say the “r” in words like “carriage.” Someone with FAS (especially the structural type) will likely still not make that “r” sound. That means their speech won’t exactly match with the accent it’s similar to," Cleveland Clinic explains.

There doesn't seem to be a cure for the condition, though speech therapy may help but there's no guarantee that it will take away the accent completely. It is mainly used to help people with FAS communicate more clearly. Thankfully for Althia, it seems that while her accent may still feel like a bit of a shock, she can communicate clearly with those around her. But for a woman born in London, her Italian accent sure will make for an interesting conversation at parties.