Over a decade after being diagnosed with a ruptured brain aneurysm, actress Tamala Jones has made it her mission to educate the community on the importance of personal health. Surviving a swollen and spouted blood vessel at the young age of 23, Jones is a prime example that this medical condition can happen to anyone.

After being overly self-conscious thinking herself to be weak for undergoing a possible life-threatening condition, the Hollywood starlet recently decided to go public with her past health issues. Remembering the brutal pain and divine blessing of her aneurysm, Jones shares her near-fatal health scare in her own words.

“[I woke] up one morning with a massive headache; feeling like I had to use the bathroom, like I had to urinate really bad. When I got out of bed I had no balance. I was walking on my toes and I was stomping. I had no control over my body weight. I looked in the mirror and I’m telling you two seconds after I looked in that mirror I dropped and hit the floor.

I kept hearing myself tell myself, “Get up, get up now. Get up, get up, get up…,” and I kind of woke up as if somebody shook me out of a sleep, and the whole right side of my body was numb. I called work and I told them, “Something’s wrong with me. I can’t come in. I have to go to the hospital.” They told me, “You need to come into work. This is the last day of shooting for this season, and we don’t have time to wait for you to go to the doctor’s office.”

Read more about how Jones’ brain aneurysm changed her life at BlackDoctor.Org.

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 (Photo: Frederick M. Brown/Getty Images)