American woman suffering from headaches claims she woke up with a British accent
'Everybody only sees or hears Mary Poppins'
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Your support makes all the difference.In a shocking medical case, an American woman who suffered from severe migraines fell asleep and woke up with a British accent - and she still suffers from the condition two years on.
Former beauty queen Michelle Myers, from Buckeye, Arizona now speaks with a London accent - despite having never left the United States.
Rather than picking up the accent while studying abroad, the mum of seven suffers from a rare medical condition diagnosed as Foreign Accent Syndrome - a condition usually associated with neurological damage.
According to the University of Texas, Foreign Accent Syndrome is “a speech disorder that causes a sudden change to speech so that a native speaker is perceived to speak with a foreign accent and is most often caused by damage to the brain caused by a stroke or traumatic brain injury.”
And this isn’t the first time Myers has picked up a new accent.
According to Myers, there have been three separate instances where she has gone to sleep with a crippling headache only to find herself speaking with a new accent.
The first time it happened, Myers ended up Irish. And the next, the mum woke up to find herself speaking with an Australian accent.
However, this is the first time an accent has lasted more than a week.
Speaking to ABC Arizona about her rare condition, Myers said: “They send in the psychiatrist at the hospital and make sure you’re not a loon.”
And although Myer’s diagnosis sounds unbelievable, numerous hospital visits and specialists have come to the conclusion that she suffers from Ehlers-Danlos syndrome - which they believe has led to her accented speech.
According to the NHS, Ehlers-Danlos syndrome is a rare condition that affects connective tissue and results in skin that bruises easily and loose unstable joints.
Despite the diagnosis, Myers just wants her normal voice back.
She told ABC Arizona: “I’m sad. I feel like a different person.”
And Myers is tired of people not taking her seriously.
“Some people think it’s physiological; others think it’s psychological. People like me - we don’t care which one it is. We just want to be taken seriously,” she said.
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