She told her father George about her headache at around 5pm on May 17, 2020, and 15 minutes later she was screaming from the pain.

At first, Mr Ferguson thought Chloe's symptoms may have been exacerbated by her autism. But he soon realised something wasn't right and did what any father would do and sought medical advice from the Nurse-On-Call.

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But then Chloe began vomiting and he swiftly took his daughter to Kyneton Hospital.

"Her screams were animalistic and not normal," Mr Ferguson said. "I rushed her to the hospital after having a quick shower to get the vomit off and she started feeling dizzy.

"After a couple of hours at Kyneton Hospital where they were talking to the Royal Children's Hospital, they said she had a very big brain bleed and rushed us to Melbourne."

Chloe's brain bleed was caused by a stroke.

The 10-year-old spent the next five days in a medically-induced coma to take pressure off her brain.

"I'd never heard about strokes in children before," Mr Ferguson said.

"In children about 80 per cent of those who stroke show F.A.S.T symptoms. Chloe was in the other 20 per cent who had nausea."

Chloe's stroke was in the midst of Victoria's first coronavirus lockdown period so visitation over the course of the four weeks the youngster was in Melbourne was difficult for the Kyneton family.

Chloe even celebrated her 11^th birthday on the Cockatoo Ward in the Royal Children's Hospital before she was able to return home to Kyneton.

For the past six months, the family have been travelling to Bendigo Health for her rehabilitation appointments.

"She's got through it unbelievably well," Mr Ferguson said.

"She's lost 50 per cent of the peripheral vision in left eye and she has some cognitive issues, we've probably lost a lot of gains we'd made with the autism.

"It's been pretty tough on Chloe but she was able to return to school at the end of last year."

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The Ferguson family have made it their mission to raise awareness about childhood strokes and Mr Ferguson is using his friends at the Kyneton Football Club to begin 'Operation Jellyfish' to encourage members to tell eight friends about the stroke warning signs.

"I asked that to the neurosurgeon how close we were to losing her and he said there are people who put their child to bed because they don't know it's a stroke," Mr Ferguson said.

"Time is the most crucial thing and it shows just how lucky we were.

"People need to know the symptoms and not just the normal ones. Go onto the Stroke Foundation website and look at the other symptoms.

"I'd hate for someone else to have this in their family so we're trying to educate as many people as we can by giving out forms at work for health checks.

"I think education is important, this is too important not to get out there.

"We were very lucky and we have to thank the surgeons and teams at the Kyneton Hospital and the Royal Children's Hospital. I thought I knew what heroes were but the true heroes are what I found down there."

For more information head to the Stroke Foundation: strokefoundation.org.au

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