"Rugby player who had stroke woke up gay and became hairdresser" and "Burly rugby player has a stroke after freak gym accident… wakes up gay and becomes a hairdresser" are the types of headlines flying around the internet after a Welsh man's assertion he was gay when he woke up after a stroke. Chris Birch, 26, was engaged to a woman, worked in a bank and played rugby - until he suffered a freak accident when he attempted a back flip and broke his neck. He has detailed the life-changing impact of his stroke in a series of newspapers. "It sounds strange but when I came round I immediately felt different. I wasn't interested in women anymore," he is reported as saying. "I had never been attracted to a man before - I'd never even had any gay friends. But I didn't care about who I was before, I had to be true to my feelings. "Suddenly I hated everything about my old life. I didn't get on with my friends, I hated sport and found my job boring. "I started to take more pride in my appearance, bleached my hair and started working out. I went from a 19-stone skinhead to an 11-stone preened man." Birch is now working as a hairdresser and has a boyfriend.
Credit: GayNZ.com Daily News staff
First published: Thursday, 10th November 2011 - 11:42am