A TV news anchor who had the beginnings of a stroke on live TV has revealed a text she sent on that day to her husband, illustrating how out of sorts she was.
The incoherent text was sent by Oklahoma TV presenter Julie Chin after the broadcast, demonstrating how much she was affected by the sudden illness.
You can see the whole thing unfold in the video below.
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She wrote: “I need help. Something is not Run today. My work won’t work is working my help my.”
Obviously, that’s not a usual text to send to anyone.
On the TODAY programme on NBC, Chin explained: “I never send messages like that obviously. That just shows my state of mind that morning.
“I just couldn’t put any words together as hard as I tried.”
Chin was trying to deliver a piece to camera about the NASA Artemis I rocket but was unable to and stumbled over her words during the broadcast.
What’s more, she lost some of her vision in her eye and her hand and arm went numb.
Showing remarkable professionalism under pressure - although it may not have been advised - she apologised to the viewers and managed to get the broadcast focus away to the weather forecaster while her colleagues called 911.
In a Facebook post after the fact, she said doctors believed she had the ‘beginnings of a stroke’.
Speaking on the TV, she said that now she’s feeling ‘good’ and that she’s undergone tests since the incident.
“The doctors right now — and we’re doing more tests — but they think it was the beginning of a stroke.
“They think maybe my body corrected itself midway so I didn’t have a full stroke,” Chin said.
“They wanted to make sure all the major things were OK so we did MRIs, CAT scans and blood tests and all sorts of things.
“They were able to let me out of the hospital and so now I’m just seeing more specialists and more doctors and getting more opinions because we really don’t know what caused this and, of course, I want to know what caused it and maybe we can prevent it from happening again.”
Chin, who is in her 40s, has no family history of strokes or problems with stress, so isn’t sure how she ended up suffering with the symptoms of a stroke.
She explained: “I felt great that morning. I had a good night’s sleep,
“I felt good and that section that everybody’s seen me struggling with, I wrote that little section!
“I knew what I was trying to say like the back of my hand.
“It just obviously wouldn’t come out of my mouth.”
Now, she wants to encourage others to be aware of the potential symptoms of strokes, as well as getting help as quickly as possible.
She warned: “When it comes to anything medical, if you think you need help, if something’s really not right, don’t be afraid to ask for help,
"I tried to tough through it and that wasn’t the best thing to do.
“This is just proof to me, for people who are wondering, like there’s so much bad stuff in the world, but there’s so much good.
“Because here’s my little video clip that’s gone all around the world, and it's maybe not my proudest professional moment, but people have been so kind and they’ve been cheering me on and praying for me and our family couldn’t be more grateful.”
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Topics: Health, US News, Film and TV
Tom Wood