Foreign Accent Syndrome: Scottish woman speaks with Italian accent following stroke
Baku, October 5 (AZERTAC). When Debbie McCann, 48, had a minor stroke in November last year, she was left with a voice she didn`t recognize, according to Telegraph.
She has since been diagnosed with Foreign Accent Syndrome, an extremely rare medical condition where a person starts speaking in a different accent due to a brain injury, stroke or migraine.
Just 60 people on the planet are affected by the condition when has left Debbie sounding more Botticelli than Braveheart
Mrs McCann said: "I`ve lived in Glasgow all my life and had a strong Glaswegian accent before the stroke.
"For the first two weeks, I couldn`t speak at all and it was very frustrating. When my voice came back, I sounded Chinese. I couldn`t believe it.
Now, people say I sound more like I`m from Italy, yet I`ve never been to either of those countries."
Mrs McCann was at home with her daughter Julieanne, 24, when her hands started shaking and her speech became slurred.
When Julieanne sat her mum down in a chair, she slumped to one side. She was taken to hospital where a doctor said he thought it might be a minor stroke.
Although tests, including an MRI scan, run by a neurologist came back clear.
Mrs McCann, who was forced to quit her job as a shop assistant, has an appointment with a neurologist in November and hopes they will confirm it was a stroke.
It has left her with weakness on her right side and she is unable to drive.
She was diagnosed with Foreign Accent Syndrome in June after friends said they thought she had the condition after seeing a clip of a sufferer online.
Mrs McCann said: "I`m having speech therapy and every day I wake up hoping my old voice will be back.
She said it`s only now she feels brave enough to go out on her own.
Mrs McCann said: "It`s made me very embarrassed to speak to people. I only go shopping where I used to work because everyone knows me there.
The condition also affects Mrs McCann`s facial movements and she writes with a foreign accent - meaning she often misses out words like `to` and `a` from sentences.
For example when she wrote to a friend she had been referred to a stroke clinic, she actually wrote: "I been referred to stroke clinic."
Residential children`s worker Julieanne said it has been hard watching her mum suffer.
Around 60 people worldwide have been affected Foreign Accent Syndrome since it was first identified in the 1940s when a Norwegian woman was hit by shrapnel and started speaking with a strong German accent.
Debbie went to see Dr Anja Lowitt, an expert in the condition from Strathclyde University, to see what was happening with her speech.
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