When 34-year-old Bandra-based fashion designer Keith Gomes experienced an excruciating pain in his head last Friday evening, he dismissed it as a bad headache. He went to the gym like he had been doing for the last eight years, six days a week. "On Saturday morning, I was feeling better," he said from his bed at Peddar Road's Jaslok hospital. "I went to my Worli office and was discussing design ideas with my boss Sonu Dharnidharka, when suddenly I realised I was having trouble speaking. I thought I was imagining it." It was when he realised that he could not move his right hand that he panicked. "Sonu took one look at me and knew she had to move fast. With help from a peon, she took me to Breach Candy hospital where I threw up as I was being wheeled in."

Keith Gomes at the hospital right before discharge. PICS/SHADAB KHAN