When Alex Opare-Darko collapsed in a supermarket last year after a massive stroke, doctors told his heartbroken wife to prepare for the worst. Yet today, far from being in the predicted vegetative state, he is preparing to return to work. THOMAS HAWORTH reports...

“Death is only an incident, and not the most important one which happens to us in the state of being,” wrote a reflective Winston Churchill in 1915. These seductive words were penned by the Old Lion – then a young cub – in a letter to his wife to be opened only in the event of his death.

And through the ensuing fog of Hell it is a miracle that he, indeed anyone, made it out alive. To borrow from astronomer Carl Sagan, “Extinction is the rule. Survival is the exception.”

However, for Alex Opare-Darko, as for young Winston, rules are made to be broken.

After suffering a massive stroke last summer, 49-year-old Alex was told he would spend the rest of his life in a vegetative state unable even to eat or speak. Yet here he sits, eating and speaking.

Doctors assumed he wouldn’t make it and, in no uncertain terms, warned his family that they should prepare themselves for the inevitable. The game, in other words, was up.

Yet Alex has made a miraculous recovery, even to the point where he can seriously think about returning to his job as a manager at Swindon Borough Council.

The episode began in the summer of last year. On July 11 2015, Alex popped into Tesco in The Parade, had a stroke and was immediately airlifted to Bristol’s Southmead Hospital and placed in intensive care.

His memory of that fateful day is very hazy. “I felt myself falling backwards and I remember the manager telling people to call for an ambulance, but that’s all,” he said.

Meanwhile, Alex’s wife Nydia, 45, who teaches design technology at Faringdon Community College, went home and waited for him to return, worried, wondering where he could possibly be, when a policeman came the door to deliver the terrible news.

“I went into a panic and couldn’t think straight,” said Nydia. “All I thought about was to grab a toothbrush and an overnight bag.”

When she got to the hospital, she was devastated by what she saw.

“When I saw him in the hospital I couldn’t believe it. He was buried under wires and everything in the room was bleeping.

“They said it wasn’t looking good at all. They tried to make him as comfortable as possible but his brain was swelling at an incredible rate.”

The next three weeks involved Nydia pleading with doctors to do all they could to help her stricken husband, despite their judgement that, based on sound evidence, he would not make it home again.

“I knew my husband wasn’t ready to die,” said a resolute Nydia.

The medical staff at Southmead did all they could to make the family aware of the seriousness of Alex’s condition and their bleak predictions of the future were entirely understandable based on the circumstances.

Alex, who was frequently moved between different hospitals, arrived at the GWH from Bristol on July 29, was then moved on the Bristol Brain Injury Rehabilitation Centre on September 15, before arriving at Salisbury Glenside rehab unit on March 9.

He finally returned to his Park South home on Wednesday July 6, with months of intense physiotherapy lying ahead.

However, it wasn’t just the love of his family that got him through, or that shone the whitest light into the blackest void. It was also his faith.

Most people would be perplexed by Alex’s recovery, but as a committed member of the Lighthouse Chapel International he is plagued with few doubts.

He said: “I believe there is a god and with him anything is possible. If you trust him to do something, he will do it and I trust him now more than ever.”

Nydia agreed: “I was given hours to say goodbye to him and for me it has strengthened my faith so much more.”

“Before, I’d have said he was a part time Christian. But now he is a full time one.”

The Lighthouse Chapel International, based on Ocotal Way, is a Christian church founded in the late 1980s and headquartered in Ghana. It has branches all over the world and Alex and Nydia are keen members.

An elated Nydia said: “I don’t want to stop telling the world. I saw how down people were in the hospital and we want to empower them and say to people that, if you believe, anything is possible.”

Nursing assistant and the GWH Taneak Douglas, known to friends as Pinky and who was involved in helping Alex recover, said: “The Alex that first came into the hospital and the Alex that left are two completely different people.

“It’s is an absolute miracle. I’m lost for words, it is just unbelievable. It can only be the work of god. It’s a miracle that he’s alive today.

“I go to church because of Alex. I’ve always believed in god but I never used to take church seriously. I go all the time now, though.”

The Lighthouse Chapel International is holding a thanksgiving service for Alex on August 28 at St Joseph’s School for friends and family to celebrate his life and say a big thank you to the ambulance service and the nurses who helped care for him.

Alex’s remarkable story reveals something particularly interesting about the human spirit. It isn’t just a tale of survival against all odds but, rather, one that epitomises what can happen when a family’s love refuses to be torn apart.

For Alex, the prospect of death was very real indeed. But it was, in the end, merely an incident and, judging by his astonishing recovery, perhaps not even the most important to happen to him in this state of being.