One year after suffering a stroke, Linh (23, Long Bien, Hanoi) is gradually accepting reality as she has to restart her life.

At the beginning of 2025, after finishing her shift, Linh raised her hand to put her phone into her blouse pocket, a normal action that turned out to be her last voluntary movement for several weeks. 

Immediately afterward, she became unsteady, leaned on a colleague’s shoulder, then convulsed and lost consciousness. Doctors rushed to provide emergency care and conducted urgent imaging scans.

The results showed that Linh had a ruptured brain arteriovenous malformation (AVM), causing massive bleeding and increased intracranial pressure. Her condition was critical, with slim chances of survival. To save her, doctors had to perform emergency open-skull surgery to remove the hematoma. A portion of her skull was removed and preserved in cold storage. 

From that moment, the young nurse’s life stood on the boundary between life and death.

After the surgery came months of difficult treatment and recovery. Linh spent nearly five months hospitalized, moving between Hanoi and Thanh Hoa, facing infections and prolonged fever. By May 2025, she underwent surgery to reattach the removed skull segment.

Linh said that her lifestyle had been unhealthy: frequent late nights, bathing late, irregular eating habits due to balancing study and part-time work. Despite having no prior medical history, she ignored signs of fatigue and prolonged stress, assuming they were normal for young people. Only after the incident did she realize such habits could accumulate and “bring down” one’s health at any time.

A journey to live again 

After months of treatment, Linh returned to her hometown in the embrace of her family. Her loved ones were overjoyed to see her come back from the “realm of death.” At first, she struggled to accept the reality that she had to start over from scratch, after once being an energetic young woman.

All of Linh’s daily activities required assistance from her family. At times, she burst into tears seeing her peers enjoying youth while she had to relearn how to walk and write. Looking at photos from before her stroke and then at her now-shaven head often left her emotional.

But from that point on, she learned to accept the reality and persevere. Every day, Linh practiced breathing, speaking, eating, walking, and writing. Her trembling fingers held a pen, sometimes taking an hour to write a single word, but to her, that was the result of relentless effort.

Linh told herself that “even though my steps today are slow and shaky, they are proof of recovery. It doesn’t matter how fast or slow I go, as long as I keep moving forward each day.”

Now, as she approaches the age of 23, Linh can do simple tasks like cleaning the house and cooking. Life is no longer as vibrant as before, but she has learned to find joy in small things - a leaf, a flower in the garden, or simply being alive.

Linh has also realized that more and more young people are experiencing strokes. After sharing her story, she received many messages from others who had gone through similar experiences, seeking empathy and encouragement.

“All of us, after such incidents, feel confused and afraid. But each person learns to stand up again in their own way,” Linh said.

Stroke cases among young people are on the rise. According to a study published in Frontiers in Neurology (2025), the stroke rate among those aged 15–39 reached 25.45 cases per 100,000 people in 2021, with 101 countries reporting rates above the global average.

The Stroke Center at Bach Mai Hospital (Hanoi) warns that risk factors for stroke in young people include unhealthy diets, lack of physical activity, and work-related stress.

Vietnam is currently among the countries with a high stroke incidence worldwide. Notably, most patients still do not access emergency care in time. Only about 23.2 percent reach the “golden window” (4.5 hours), and just 20 percent are transported via professional emergency systems, the key factors determining survival and recovery.

Ha Nguyen