Adam Lopez: UK Lottery winner’s dream turns to nightmare after wild partying ends in hospital emergency

Adam Lopez’s stroke of luck turned into a sobering lesson after his £1 million ($A2,036,460) lottery win spiralled into a health emergency.

The forklift driver from the village of Mattishall in Norfolk, England, saw his bank balance skyrocket from £12.40 to £1,000,012.40 in July after buying five £5 scratch-off tickets from a local corner store near Norwich.

“When I saw the £1M I didn’t know what to do with myself, so shoved the scratchcard in the glovebox without even thinking,” Mr Lopez, 39, revealed after realising he’d hit the jackpot.

“I always thought I’d scream if I ever won big, but when it actually happened, I was stunned into complete silence!”

“Never in my wildest dreams did I think this would happen to me, I feel so blessed,” he continued.

“I’ve given myself a budget to have fun, a pot to treat people I love and the rest I’m saving for the future.”

People reported that at first, Mr Lopez revelled in the windfall, showering his family with gifts they’d long dreamed of — including new Range Rovers for himself and his mother, and a lavish family trip to Barbados.

But soon, what started as a celebration turned into a whirlwind of indulgence.

“I left my job and I never should have done that,” Mr Lopez admitted to the BBC in an interview published Saturday, October 4.

“I lost the structure to my life and day-to-day living ... it was a complete disconnect from the life I was living.”

Months of partying and excess eventually caught up with him. Mr Lopez was rushed to the hospital after suffering a bilateral pulmonary embolism, the result of a blood clot that travelled from his leg to his lungs.

“It’s allowed me to live a bit of a life I’ve never lived, but I think I went the wrong way about it,” Mr Lopez said of the lavish lifestyle he’d embraced.

“It was enjoyable until my health became an issue.”

He added, “I couldn’t walk, I couldn’t breathe. I rang the ambulance, I got wheeled into the ambulance from my house, and the biggest life-changing thing I had was lying in the back of that ambulance and hearing the sirens.”

After more than eight days in the Norfolk & Norwich University Hospital, Mr Lopez says the terrifying ordeal became the wake-up call he needed to slow down and rebuild a sense of normality.

“It just makes you look at both sides of life because it doesn’t matter if you have a million, 100 million, a billion, a trillion — when you’re in the back of the ambulance, none of it matters.”