Search icon

Lifestyle

26th Jan 2024

‘I woke up one morning and had a thick Geordie accent’

Callum Boyle

Geordie accent

Howay

We’ve all tried to replicate some of the fine accents up and down the country, but imagine waking up one day and your accent being completely different?

That’s what happened to one Staffordshire barber, who said that she woke up one morning with a “thick Geordie accent”.

Verity Went, 26, has grown up with a Midlands accent all of her life but noticed the sudden change after waking up from a nap.

While she is yet to receive a formal diagnosis, Verity has been told by multiple doctors that it could be a case of foreign accent syndrome – a condition where the way you talk shifts and changes in a way that’s sudden and very noticeable.

Speaking on ITV’s programme This Morning, Verity revealed that the change in accent has made her more confident.

“I’m more confident now and I think, in myself more, I used to be a people pleaser,” she explained.

“Whereas now, I do everything for myself – very black and white – it’s improved [things] for myself.”

Josie asked Verity: “Do you prefer this version of yourself?” to which she replied: “Yeah, definitely – I don’t want it to change.”

To make matters more confusing, Verity now finds it impossible to speak in her original West Midlands accent and that whenever she tries to think of it there’s a “block” in her brain.

Those who watched on couldn’t believe what they had seen. One person wrote on X: “Can I wake up with a Geordie accent? Having a West Midlands accent is depressing.”

A second said: “I mean I’m a Brummie and I wish I’d wake up with a Geordie accent too…. It’s just not going to happen. What absolute b******s! She has been training to go onto Geordie Shore ain’t she.”

Related links: