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Emilia Clarke Opens Up About Her Brain Surgeries; Says She Thought She Was 'Going To Get Fired'
Emilia Clarke revealed she feared dying on live TV during her brain surgeries, which significantly altered her sense of self.
The Anglo-French actress best known for her role as Daenerys Targaryen in HBO’s Game of Thrones, Emilia Clarke has recently disclosed the struggles she confronted after suffering two aneurysms during the show's filming. Now 37, Clarke sat down for a Big Issue interview to discuss how the road accidents affected her personality and fitness for work.
“When you have a brain injury, because it alters your sense of self on such a dramatic level, all of the insecurities you have going into the workplace quadruple overnight,” Clarke told the outlet.
“The first fear we all had was: ‘Oh my God, am I going to get fired? Am I going to get fired because they think I’m not capable of completing the job?’” she added.
With the stress and pressure ahead following the acting and especially in taking up such a prestigious acting role, the fear of a brain hemorrhage returned. Clarke remembered how she thought, saying to herself, “Well if I’m going to die, I better die on live TV,” comments explaining the stress she felt while working while suffering from her illness.
Clarke’s confession about battles shows the tremendous amount of pressure she faced, and her ability to face and conquer the life-threatening ordeals while continuing to act.
Emilia Clarke turns brain trauma into 'Super-Hero Power' with charity SameYou
After one year of establishment and to date late 2020, Emilia Clarke and her mother Jennifer Clarke established SameYou; an organization aimed at supporting brain injury recovery. This endeavor sought to foster individuals who are in the process of rehabilitation after grueling brain injuries with Clarke having struggled with two aneurysms. BIG ISSUE RECRUIT is a specialist recruitment service provider whose primary aim is to provide sustainable paid work for marginalized people who are disadvantaged in their attempts to find employment.
In an interview with The Big Issue, Clarke explained the issues she faced with loneliness and loss of self-esteem upon sustaining the brain injuries. Others focused on feelings of loneliness; she used strong poignant says, “Having a chronic condition that diminishes your confidence in this one thing you feel is your reason to live is so debilitating and so lonely,” Clarke has taken a step further to establish a charity to help lonely people and those with similar difficulties.
Telling the worst, Clarke was as low as one can be during her time in rehabilitation. Due to this, she could only whisper, expressing her concern that she felt so helpless about her condition or the implication it might have for her future, she had been begging medical staff to let her succumb. Yet, as the informed reader can tell Clarke now sees her journey through the process of brain injury recovery as a positive one, she has embraced it she used the term super-hero power in referring to it.
Emilia Clarke opens up about life-altering brain hemorrhage during 'Game of Thrones' filming
Emilia Clarke’s first brain hemorrhage occurred in 2011 when she was twenty-nine years old and was filming the first season of Game of Thrones and it was a subarachnoid hemorrhage that caused a stroke. Clarke shared this experience in her memo, published in The New Yorker in January 2019. A few weeks ago, Mrs D was exercising in a gym when she suddenly became very ill and needed a brain operation. Clarke also fell victim to aphasia in the following weeks after the surgery; it is understood as the creation of distinct troubles by damage to the cerebral cortex. She said it was life-changing and when asked what it was like two weeks instantly she said I couldn’t remember my name.
This was evidenced by the fact that the condition strained her mental health severely. Clarke vividly recalled the depth of her despair, "Worst moments while caring for my parents, I wished the pipe burst," she admitted candidly.
"I was suffering from a condition called aphasia, a consequence of the trauma my brain had suffered," she said in the candid piece.
"In my worst moments, I wanted to pull the plug," she wrote. "I asked the medical staff to let me die. My job, my entire dream of what my life would be, centered on language, on communication. Without that, I was lost."
Emilia Clarke reflects on brain surgeries
However, after some time, Emilia Clarke regained the ability to speak notwithstanding the effects of aphasia that she earlier had. But she needed to have another surgery in 2013, due to another one, aneurysm.
Speaking to PEOPLE in a detailed interview in 2021, Clarke revealed just how these life-saving surgeries changed her outlook on what she considered as being beautiful enough to make her worth living for. She stressed that beauty is when one is happy and confident not pretty-faced; meaning beauty has nothing to do with the facial appearance of a woman. "The happy moments and being happy is what you're going to see on your deathbed. You're not going to remember the times when you took that super cute selfie," she said.
She also explained the shifts in thought regarding the issue of beauty ‘After the surgery, because I felt so scared and under-confident, I was putting all of that into how I looked, As I got older I realized that people are at their most beautiful when they are not thinking about their physical appearance and what the world thinks about it,” Lisa’s experiences paved way for inner beauty and self-acceptance, which in turn changed her outlook in life.
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