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Emilia Clarke Birthday Special Throwback: When Game Of Thrones Star Said Playing Daenerys Targaryen 'Saved Her Life'
As Game of Thrones star Emilia Clarke turns 38, we look back at a special moment when the actress revealed how transforming into Daenerys Targaryen gave her the power to 'save her life'
Game of Thrones star Emilia Clarke turned 38 on Wednesday, October 23. As the actress celebrates her special day, let us take a moment to revisit the time when she revealed how playing the iconic role of Daenerys Targaryen in the popular HBO series helped save her life.
During a 2021 interview with Variety, Clarke opened up about her real-life health battles and said that it was Khaleesi aka Daenerys who helped her cope with two brain aneurysms and consecutive surgeries.
“I always say that Daenerys literally saved my life,” Clarke said at the time. “Because it puts you in quite the headspace when you've had a brain injury,” she added.
The actress explained how dealing with life and death situations after stepping into Daenerys’ shoes for each season of Game of Thrones made her feel powerful. She then said that she could only see through Daenerys’ lens in those moments and felt like the character was saving her through the same power.
Emilia Clarke first discussed her medical challenges during a 2021 interview with The New Yorker. The Me Before You star revealed that she suffered her first brain aneurysm in 2011, shortly after wrapping up the third season of Game of Thrones.
The actress described how she felt like “an elastic band was squeezing my brain” when she experienced her first aneurysm while working out at a gym in North London. Clarke recalled how she attempted to ignore the pain and push through her training but failed to do the same.
She then took a break, crawled to the locker room and eventually to the washroom before falling “violently, voluminously ill.” Clarke shared how she felt a “shooting, stabbing, constricting pain” and somehow realized that “my brain was damaged.”
The Last Christmas star was diagnosed with a subarachnoid hemorrhage after taking an MRI test and quietly underwent her first brain surgery.
“I was in the middle of my very busy life... I had no time for brain surgery,” she recalled thinking at the time. “But, finally, I settled down and signed,” the actress added.
Clarke also revealed she was just 24 years old during her first surgery. She further shared how she knew it would neither be her last surgery nor “the worst.”
Emilia Clarke underwent another surgery in 2013 and successfully treated her second aneurysm.
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