{"id":874839,"date":"2026-10-08T06:40:18","date_gmt":"2026-10-08T06:40:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/874839\/"},"modified":"2026-10-08T06:40:18","modified_gmt":"2026-10-08T06:40:18","slug":"wedding-day-stroke-leaves-lancaster-county-native-couple-rebuilding-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/874839\/","title":{"rendered":"Wedding day stroke leaves Lancaster County-native couple rebuilding life"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Michael<\/a><\/p>\n

What was supposed to be the start of a new chapter for Anna and Connor Lasco turned into a medical emergency on their wedding day.<\/p>\n

\"\"\"\"<\/p>\n

The Lancaster County native couple said Anna began feeling dizzy while getting ready for their Sept. 5 wedding in Rochester, New York. Her symptoms quickly worsened.<\/p>\n

\u201cI had this loud buzzing noise in my left ear,\u201d Anna Lasco said. \u201cAnd suddenly my leg, left leg specifically, like, gave out under me.\u201d<\/p>\n

She said her vertigo became severe and her speech was affected.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt sounded like I was intoxicated,\u201d Anna Lasco said. \u201cPeople actually asked me if I was intoxicated.\u201d<\/p>\n

Connor Lasco said he knew something was wrong when he saw her.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I did arrive at that venue and was called in there\u2026 Her eyes were very wide,\u201d Connor Lasco said. \u201cAnd that\u2019s really when I kind of felt something wasn\u2019t normal.\u201d<\/p>\n

Couple still gets married, then heads to hospital<\/p>\n

The couple still got married, but Connor carried Anna to the altar because she could no longer walk reliably. After the ceremony, they went straight to the hospital.<\/p>\n

\"\"\"\"<\/p>\n

Doctors diagnosed Anna with a left vertebral artery dissection, a tear in an artery that supplies blood to the brain. She was later flown by helicopter to another hospital, where doctors said she had suffered a stroke.<\/p>\n

\"\"\"\"Doctor explains rare condition<\/p>\n

Dr. Faisal Aziz, chief of vascular surgery at Penn State Health, said a dissection is essentially a tear inside a blood vessel.<\/p>\n

\"\"\"\"<\/p>\n

He said vertebral artery dissections can be difficult to recognize because symptoms may start with dizziness, nonspecific headaches, vertigo or feeling off balance.<\/p>\n

\u201cUsually in the beginning, they may start off as dizziness, nonspecific headaches at the back, vertigo or feeling off balance,\u201d Aziz said. \u201cIf the symptoms get worse, they can lead to double vision, blurred vision, sometimes even loss of vision in severe cases. And they can progress to slurred speech or trouble swallowing.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"\"\"<\/p>\n

Aziz said the condition is rare, affecting roughly one to two people out of every 100,000 each year, but it can happen in younger adults.<\/p>\n

He said dissections can follow obvious injuries, such as a car crash, fall or sports contact, but they can also happen after sudden or forceful neck movement \u2014 and sometimes without a clear cause.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have seen it with roller-coaster rides or sometimes with yoga, extreme stretching of the neck during an exercise, sometimes even with severe cough or vomiting\u2014and sometimes without any clear causes,\u201d Aziz said.<\/p>\n

He said people should not ignore sudden symptoms such as dizziness, vertigo or eye symptoms.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is fortunate that these neck accidents or traumas don’t happen that often,\u201d Aziz said. \u201cBut the key thing is that when they happen and symptoms\u2014dizziness, vertigo, eye symptoms\u2014happen, one should not ignore that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Read up on the Cleveland Clinic’s information on vertebral artery dissections here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Recovery and rehabilitation<\/p>\n

Doctors say many dissections heal with medical care and monitoring.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe natural history is actually very good,\u201d Aziz said. \u201cMost of them, they heal pretty quick, and most of the symptoms resolve on their own.\u201d<\/p>\n

Doctors stress that dizziness or a headache alone does not necessarily mean someone has an artery dissection. But sudden or severe symptoms \u2014 especially vision changes, weakness, facial drooping, difficulty speaking or trouble walking \u2014 should be treated as an emergency. They say to call 911 rather than drive yourself to the hospital.<\/p>\n

Anna spent 18 days in the hospital and is now recovering at home. She said even simple movements now take concentration.<\/p>\n

\"\"\"\"<\/p>\n

\u201cIt takes a lot of mental strength,\u201d Anna Lasco said. \u201cIt\u2019s like I actually am trying to walk.\u201d<\/p>\n

Connor Lasco said the couple is taking recovery day by day.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re going to get better,\u201d Connor Lasco said. \u201cThis is the journey we\u2019re walking together.\u201d<\/p>\n

To support the Lascos, visit their GoFundMe page here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"What was supposed to be the start of a new chapter for Anna and Connor Lasco turned into…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":874840,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[3232,368252,129869,368238,368247,87139,10308,368251,368239,317424,8279,3281,368242,97,368245,1493,368246,22326,368249,33134,79766,368250,368241,3590,5586,368244,5418,368248,368240,107794,49686,350360,368243,62420,71120,15780,6074,59844],"class_list":["post-874839","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health","tag-3232","tag-altar","tag-anna","tag-anna-lasco","tag-artery-tear","tag-aziz","tag-blood","tag-blurred-vision","tag-connor-lasco","tag-dizziness","tag-doctor","tag-doctors","tag-faisal-aziz","tag-health","tag-helicopter-flight","tag-hospital","tag-hospital-recovery","tag-lancaster-county","tag-left-vertebral-artery-dissection","tag-medical-emergency","tag-neck","tag-nonspecific-headache","tag-penn-state-health","tag-people","tag-rochester-new-york","tag-slurred-speech","tag-stroke","tag-stroke-symptoms","tag-stroke-under-50","tag-symptom","tag-vascular","tag-vascular-surgery","tag-vertebral-artery-dissection","tag-vertigo","tag-wedding","tag-wedding-day","tag-young-adults","tag-young-people"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/874839","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=874839"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/874839\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/874840"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=874839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=874839"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=874839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}