I never thought about giving up

He had collapsed in front of the sofa with the Antiques Roadshow on in the background. His body was contorted, his right side caught under him and his face was lopsided. Suspecting he’d suffered a stroke, Grace called an ambulance and Edwyn was taken to the nearby Royal Free Hospital in Hampstead.

“During the first days he was unable to communicate and in a permanently restless state but he was able to sit up and have a drink of water,” says Grace.

A devastating second brain haemorrhage just five days later was followed by surgery to evacuate the bleeding and remove a portion of bone from his skull. Grace, 51, was told by doctors that if and when Edwyn woke up, the damage to his brain would be severe.

“They told me a blood vessel in his brain had burst under pressure,” she says. “There’s no obvious reason why. Edwyn wasn’t a smoker or heavy drinker and he hadn’t seen a doctor for 10 years.

“The burst blood vessel had trailed a path of destroyed tissue in its wake, continuing until the pressure itself stopped the bleeding. The stroke was located in the left side of Edwyn’s brain.”

It meant he couldn’t sit up, walk, read or write and had no movement in his right-hand side. He was also suffering from aphasia, a condition which meant he couldn’t understand or use language.

“The only things I could say when I woke were, ‘the possibilities are endless’, which I’d repeat again and again, as well as ‘yes’ and ‘no’,” recalls Edwyn who, four years on, speaks in fluent but short sentences.

“I remember feeling frightened. It took a month to realise what had happened. My memories start from there. Inside my head I felt like myself but outside of that I couldn’t communicate”

It was devastating for Edinburgh-born Edwyn, who, prior to his two strokes, was a well-known singer and guitarist with the group Orange Juice and who had a worldwide hit in 1995 with his song A Girl Like You.

Combining music, speech and art therapies with sheer determination, Edwyn battled to regain his basic skills. Today he can speak, walk unaided and he’s learned to write and draw with his left hand. His recovery has been so astonishing that this summer he is back playing music festivals across the UK and is planning an exhibition of his recent artwork in the autumn.

Grace has also written a book, Falling And Laughing: The Restoration Of Edwyn Collins, to tell his inspiring story.

In May 2005 Edwyn was transferred to a rehabilitation unit at Northwick Park Hospital in north-west London.

“He was looked after by a physiotherapy team, a speech and language team, his occupational therapist, a neuropsychologist and a nurse,” recalls Grace. “By the end of August he was able to walk with assistance. There wasn’t a eureka moment, just a gradual steadying and more balance. He also had Botox injected into his right arm and leg to reduce spasticity, which proved successful.”

Once Edwyn left the unit, he and Grace wanted to build on what he had achieved, creating their own programme of therapy. “The progress Edwyn made was huge. He had physiotherapy at Parkside Hospital in Wimbledon and was quickly able to go up and down stairs. He walked greater distances and in early September I folded his wheelchair up for good. In the car he practised reading road signs. We also used Ladybird books. Edwyn wanted to read again,” says Grace.

During this time, he rediscovered his passion for drawing and singing. “At first my drawings were crude,” Edwyn says. “Then they got better. I’m learning to take my time, using my left hand. My singing is coming along too. I’ve written 10 new songs and relearned many of my old ones. I’ve also published a book of my drawings of British birds.”

Despite being unable to move his right hand he has managed to find a way to play guitar again. “I play the chords but Grace does the other hand,” says Edwyn.

“It was typical of Edwyn,” says Grace. “With a bit of creativeness you can find a solution.”

Some relationships might buckle under the strain of such gruelling rehabilitation but she believes the experience has brought them closer. “That’s not to say I don’t have my off days but there was never a point where I felt like walking away,” she says.

Both feel their open-minded attitude has contributed to Edwyn’s progress. “One thing that’s driven us is a fear of not being able to get better,” says Grace. “There are a lot of words banded about at hospital such as ‘accepting’ and ‘coming to terms with’ and I didn’t want to do any of that.

“I would say to people who find themselves in this situation, if you hear anybody being negative, don’t listen. You can invent your own story and find your own course.”

To order Falling And Laughing: The Restoration Of Edwyn Collins by Grace Maxwell (Ebury, £16.99) with free UK delivery, call 0871 521 1301 (10p/min from BT landlines) or send a cheque payable to Express Newspapers to: Express Bookshop, PO Box 200, Falmouth, TR11 4WJ or visit www.expressbookshop.co.uk

Grace and Edwyn support Connect, a charity for people living with aphasia: www.ukconnect.org