BARNSNAPLE — The newborn son in the photograph was a stranger. Mike Jewell, 42, stared at the 10-month-old boy his wife Ellie held out to him and said “What?” He had no memory of the child’s birth, no memory of holding him, no memory of his name. Morgan, his own son, had been erased from his mind by a haemorrhagic stroke and two weeks in an induced coma.
The stroke hit in September 2025. Mike was pressing apples with friends, had a few drinks, and started falling over.
His friends thought the alcohol was the cause. They laid him down. He went home the next morning to Ellie, 38, and slept nearly a full day.
When he finally woke, he had a “banging headache.” Ellie heard his slurred speech and rushed him to hospital. Doctors found bleeding in or around his brain.
Emergency surgery relieved the pressure. Then came the coma. Two weeks of induced unconsciousness.
When Mike emerged, his life had changed in a way no one had prepared him for. The son he had fathered was there, but the memory of that event was gone. “I absolutely adore him – he’s brilliant – but at first I just didn’t know what was going on,” Mike told PA Real Life.
The stakes were not just memory. Medical staff told Mike he might never walk again.
A carpenter and joiner by trade, a father of three — Alanah, four, and Evie, 13, in addition to Morgan — he faced the prospect of permanent disability. He could lose his job, his mobility, his ability to care for his family. Mike decided otherwise.
In one week, he relearnt everyday tasks. He figured out how to use his phone’s touchscreen again.
He made a cup of tea. A few weeks later, he walked out of hospital and returned home. By February 2026, he was back at work full-time, doing the carpentry and joinery that had been his livelihood.
The family lives in Barnstaple, Devon. Mike is a carpenter and joiner. The stroke came while pressing apples with friends.
The details are ordinary. The consequences were not.
For Mike, the missing memory of his son was the strangest part. “I had no recollection of him or him being born. It was so weird.
He had completely gone from my mind.” The bond with Morgan had to be rebuilt from scratch. Not from the moment of birth, but from waking up and being told “Here’s your son, he’s yours.” Stroke recovery is unpredictable.
Mike relearnt walking. He improved his speech. He returned to work.
But the memory loss for that specific period — the birth and early months of his son’s life — remains a hole in his personal history. The son he adores is the same son he does not remember becoming a father to. The timeline is exact.
September 2025: the stroke. Two weeks in a coma.
Then waking to a stranger in his arms. Then the slow, determined work of getting back to normal. By February 2026, he was back on the job.
That is less than six months from emergency brain surgery to full-time carpentry. Mike Jewell did not let the prognosis stop him.
He was told he might never walk. He walked. He was told he might not work again.
He works. But the memory of his son’s first months — those are gone. He lives with that loss every day, even as he holds the boy he does not remember.
