A WOMAN who survived a life-threatening brain haemorrhage is grateful to villagers for supporting the hospital where she received excellent care.

Clare Wade, who runs the Village Butcher in Tarporley with husband Rob, felt like she had been ‘hit over the head with a cricket bat’ as she got out of the shower at home last July.

When Clare, 34, started to vomit Rob dialled 999 for an ambulance with scans revealing a bleed on the brain which was sealed by doctors at Liverpool’s Walton Centre using platinum coils inserted through an artery.

She then suffered a series of mini-strokes affecting her speech but medics took action to disperse the blood in her brain and today she is fit and well once again thanks to Walton.

Well-wishers sent Clare 200 get well cards, as well as flowers and teddy bears. Later Rachel Sims, a teaching assistant at Tarporley Primary School and Jane Taylor, a member of the Parent Teacher Association, donated £1,000 to Walton from the annual beer festival, with the remaining £5,000 going toward a new school minibus.

Looking back on what happened, Clare, who lives in Utkinton, recognises she came close to death.

“I think it was touch and go, Anything could have happened at any time,” said Clare, who still has difficulty with the odd word as a result of the mini-strokes but is otherwise fine.

“Rob’s been fantastic and my own family, my mum and dad, will be forever grateful to him for saving my life. If he had not been there and not done what he did I would have died.”

Clare said of her friends’ fundraising efforts: “When they said they were thinking about doing that I was absolutely delighted.”

Clare, originally from Essex, says she and Rob always supply the pork pies for the beer festival but this year’s event was ‘extra special’.