Meredyth and her husband Peter in Bali, before her stroke

What started as a dream Bali holiday turned into a nightmare for Meredyth Quilty when the 64-year-old had a massive stroke and woke from a weeklong coma unable to speak.

After two weeks in a Balinese hospital’s intensive care unit, Meredyth was transferred to Cabrini Malvern, where rehabilitation to recover her speech and investigations into the cause of her stroke began.

Eight months later and the mother of two has had the cause of her stroke addressed at Cabrini – a 95 per cent blockage of her carotid artery – and she is now speaking with clarity and fluidity, something her speech pathology team said is “extraordinary” given the extent of her aphasia post-stroke.

“Aphasia is a common language disorder that results from brain damage, where words are jumbled and sentences are meaningless,” Cabrini speech pathologist Jess Harper said.

“With aphasia, a person might substitute a common word for another word, or even a non-word, then not understand why people don’t know what they’re talking about.

“Whenever Meredyth used the word “light”, for example, like ‘can you put the light on please’, she’d say ‘can you put the verpasmee on please’. Poor Meredyth thought she was saying the right word and couldn’t understand why no one could understand her.”

Through intensive speech therapy, Jess has helped to repave the pathways that already existed in Meredyth’s brain to allow her to speak again.

“Meredyth’s come such a long way,” Jess said. “She’s worked very hard to get to this point and has made incredible progress.”

For Meredyth, her stroke came out of the blue.

“I was in Bali for my niece’s wedding,” Meredyth said. “My husband Peter found me in our room in the villa and immediately called for help.

“I was in ICU there for more than two weeks, and unconscious for the first week. When I woke up, I couldn’t speak at all and couldn’t use my right leg and arm. It was very scary, and very frustrating.”

Once Meredyth arrived at Cabrini, she started on her path to recovery with the support of multiple Cabrini teams, including speech pathologists and physiotherapists.

Patient Meredyth and Cabrini Speech Pathologist, Jess Harper

“It’s hard to believe how far I’ve come,” Meredyth said. “I couldn’t speak but I also couldn’t identify my family members and friends. Jess helped me to speak again, to identify objects I’d need in everyday life, like a toothbrush and a cup, and we’d look through photographs of family and friends to help me reach the point where I could recognise them and say their names.

“I’m so grateful to Jess and to everyone else who helped me get to this point.”

An MRI scan at Cabrini revealed that a 95 per cent blockage of Meredyth’s carotid artery was the cause of her stroke in Bali late last year. Cabrini vascular surgeon, Mr Charles Milne, performed surgery to unblock the artery in February this year, allowing her to live life the way she did pre-stroke.

“In April, we went on a cruise around Japan to celebrate our 30^th wedding anniversary,” Peter, Meredyth’s husband, said. “While it was a celebration of our 30 years of marriage, it was also a celebration of Meredyth and how far she’s come.

“We thought we’d lost her when we were in Bali, but now we have her back thanks to everyone at Cabrini and to Meredyth’s persistence. She’s worked so hard, and with all that support from Jess and everyone else, she’s made an amazing recovery.”

This week is Speech Pathology Week, a week to recognise the extraordinary work of speech pathology teams.

Watch Meredyth’s full story on Channel 10 News.