Emilia Clarke says it's "remarkable" she's able to speak after brain aneurysms

“It was the most excruciating pain,” Clarke says of the aneurysm and subsequent recovery. “It was incredibly helpful to have Game of Thrones sweep me up and give me that purpose.”

The actor suffered her first aneurysm in 2011, just after she concluded filming the first season of Game Of Thrones. The second came two years later, in 2013. Both incidences required emergency hospitalization and lengthy recovery periods.

Clarke previously opened up about the aneurysms in a 2019 personal essay for The New Yorker, entitled “A Battle For My Life.” In the piece, Clarke discussed the experience publicly for the first time, recalling the terror and hopelessness she felt in the hospital wondering if she would ever act, or even converse, again.

“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.”

Today, thankfully, Clarke has proved all her initial anxieties wrong—she’s continued to nab television, film, and stage roles. Clarke is currently starring as Nina in a West End production of The Seagull, as well as gearing up for McCarthy, a Joe McCarthy biopic with Michael Shannon. But Clarke hasn’t left her medical struggles completely in the past—since her recovery, she’s made a mission of giving back to others who’ve suffered brain injuries or strokes through her charity, SameYou. If there’s one thing Daenerys Targaryen is going to do, it’s mother.