Picture it: It's dinner time and you're 6 months pregnant. You try to hand your husband a plate and instead...smack it right into the side of his head. "What the heck!?" he responds. You try to explain that your arm suddenly went numb but instead of a coherent sentence, a bunch of gibberish comes out.

Sounds like a stroke, right?  We certainly thought so when that scenario played out for me 13 years ago. 3 days in the ICU and a million tests later, we found out that I wasn't having a stroke or even a TIA. I had a rare type of migraine called a Hemiplegic Migraine that has aura symptoms that mirror a stroke. 

What does that mean, exactly? Well, in my case it was one sided weakness and numbness, inability to clearly speak, and general confusion. The thing that does differentiate it from a stroke though is that I also had the typical visual aura symptoms that some people get from migraines. 

Still, visual aura alone wasn't nearly enough to rule out something more serious. Doctors did very detailed testing including an MRI, MRV, EEGs, and various tests to look for clotting factors that could be indicative a stroke. Basically, it's not something that you on your own can really differentiate from something more serious, you have to go into the hospital to be checked out...at least the first time! 

Here's a helpful chart that explains some of the symptoms: