'I was known for my smile, then one morning I woke up with my face paralysed'

A woman once known as “smiler” by all her work colleagues was left feeling like a “shell” of the person she was after waking up one morning with facial paralysis which has left her physically unable to smile.

Olivia Devyea started feeling tingles in her face one evening but went to bed, thinking she must be tired. She was horrified when she randomly woke up with a droopy eye and half of her face slowly became paralysed while she was getting ready for the day in 2019, at age 25.

After her face drooped, Olivia moved back in with her parents, did not leave the house for a fortnight, and avoided social situations for months on end – leading the once “bubbly and confident” woman to become “isolated and depressed”.

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Now 29, the TV production manager from was diagnosed with Bell’s palsy. The condition, which causes a weakness or lack of movement on one side of the face, left Olivia with “no self-confidence”, and four years since it began has only just started to improve.

She even had a round of electroacupuncture which caused further damage and synkinesis – unwanted contractions of the muscles of the face during attempted movement – that causes her eye to close when she is trying to smile. Olivia’s confidence was “shattered” when her face first became paralysed, but after accepting her condition, realising “worse things could happen” and “happiness comes from within”, she said she is now happier than ever.

“I just felt like having a big smile on my face was a part of me, and after the diagnosis, I felt like I’d lost part of my identity,” Olivia said. “(Now) I’m at this stage where I’m happier than