It's hard to believe that two whole months have passed since I found out I have two brain aneurysms. I was having severe headaches that wouldn't go away with any amount of Tylenol or any kind of NSAIDs whatsoever, so I knew something was wrong. I ended up going to urgent care only to be told, of course, that I needed to see a neurologist. They gave me a shot of Tordaol for the pain. They may have well just stuck me with a needle full of saline for the hell of it because it make no difference whatsoever. It's almost as if they entertain themselves sometimes knowing they aren't going to relieve you of your pain, but merely need to be amused. Urgent care: 1. Me: 0.
Honestly, I debated on whether or not to see a neurologist. I mean, it was a headache. People get headaches all the time, right? Right. Typically they don't last for months on end with no relief in sight and never go away day or night, though. Fine. A neurologist it was.
The doctor was nice enough. He was from Argentina and I was warned as soon as I went into the appointment that I might have a difficult time understanding him, but don't be afraid to ask him to repeat himself because he really doesn't mind, which admittedly my first thought was "well shit." Surprisingly, pleasantly, he really wasn't that hard to understand. Maybe my occupation with ESL physicians is paying off more than I thought. We talked about my headaches; frequency, causes, alleviating factors, blah blah blah. At the end of the appointment he was going to get a brain MRI scheduled for me and was trying to also get an MRA scheduled, though he warned me that insurance would probably make me go through the MRI first before approving the MRA. Then he handed me a prescription for 120 hydrocodone, which basically scared the living shit out of me. I had never been handed that many opioids all at once in my life, and quite honestly I can't even tell you all the thoughts that instantly ran through my mind. Two of them, however, were "Thank you, Jesus, I'm finally going to be able to concentrate without being in pain." and "I am so fucked." You see, the Sober part of my Ramblings of a Bipolar Sober Chick name has absolutely practically nothing to do with alcohol. Not a freaking lick. It has to do with drugs. Opioids were never my drug of choice. Cocaine was. However, I sure used a turdton of narcotics and benzos, mostly benzos, to come down from cocaine. And alcohol. I used alcohol to come down. But cocoaine was el numero uno. Anyone who has battled drug addiction, though, knows that just because something wasn't your first choice of drug, doesn't mean it can't fill in very freaking easily. Ready to jump on the rollercoaster? N-freakin-O. Lord help me.
I will be the first to admit, I was in heaven the first day I didn't have a headache so severe that I had my head completely buried in ice, because it had literally been like 4 months since I had not suffered. A day without a severe headache for once was just like a day where I ran through the woods gloriously naked and jumped on a unircorn bareback and wondered off across a rainbow that ended in a bucket of frothy warm glitter that healed all ailments I could possibly have and smelled like cotton candy. I loved that glitter. It was magnificent. Now, mind you that hydrocodone is not very strong, but when you get any kind of relief from horrific pain whatsoever it's like heroin to you. The bad part is when you have a tolerance like I do and you are suddenly reminded that your pain really actually is worse than what hydro is going to even half relieve, your brain kicks into the "I need more than one pill" gear fairly quickly. In my defense, I really DID need more than 5 mg of hydro at a time to help my head; not psychologically, but legit physically. High pain and high tolerance are a shit combination. So, I took two at a time AT THE OKAY OF MY DOCTOR, just to clarify. The unfortunate part of that is running out early. We tweaked it here and there, and fast forward about 4 months and I was still taking them. I am extremely happy to say that as HARD AS IT WAS, I never took them like I was not supposed to, and I have been weaned off all narcotics for almost 2 weeks now.
Backing up the story again....
My MRI came and went. It showed nothing at all, which REALLY upset me, because I knew something was going on in my head. It couldn't possibly hurt this bad for no reason. So, the MRA was finally approved. An MRA is like an MRI except they inject dye into your veins to take a better look at them. I left the imaging place to go and pick up my daughter after the MRA, which is an hour drive, and about half way there I get a phone call from the neurology office stating they got an urgent phone call from the New Smyrna Imaging radiologist. I had a brain aneurysm. Needless to say, I missed my exit by about 15 minutes before I realized where I was going way past where I needed to turn for my daughter's house. I was told that I would be called back later for an emergency neurosurgeon consult, which really didn't help my driving, either. The nurse even said "you are driving aren't you?" Through tears, I said, "Yes." I hung up and the first person I called was my mommy. She did not answer so I left her a blubbering and crying hysterically mumbled message on her phone, to which she called back like 5 minutes later as I was talking to my sister.
It's hard to know how you are going to react when you get news like that. I had basically just been told I'm a walking and ticking time bomb, and now I'm driving down the highway wondering if my head is going to explode. Dramatic? Maybe yes, but to me, not at that moment. What was I going to say to my kids when I got there to pick up my daughter? Would anyone even care? Did I care? I wasn't sure about anything at all.
I got to my kids' house and told my "A's" (Aspen and Andrea) the news. Andrea was quiet and accepted it; she even stayed with me 2 weeks after my surgery; but Aspen just kept saying okay and looked really uncomfortable like he was either going to scream or burst into tears, and I wasn't sure I could handle either; so he just stuck with awkward. I can handle awkward. I'm awkward. I texted their dad, because he is the father of my 4 kids His response: "Copy that." Not that I expected more. As for my two "K's", Kaileb didn't respond at all. Karah started her response with "If this is true..." That pretty much hit like a bitch, but I can (kind of) understand given the past issues that are partially and most definitely partially not my fault. Her head has been filled so far beyond the stuff that I actually did and take responsibility for that I'm not sure things will ever ever ever be the same, but that's a black hole and this is about an aneurysm. Well, two aneurysms.
Whew. So, my neurosurgeon is awesome. He spent 45 minutes with me just talking and going over all my scans and answering every single question I had. I couldn't ask for more. We decided on a cerebral angiogram to map out the aneurysms where they would go in through my femoral artery and all the way up to my brain, which was the freakiest and scariest things I'd ever heard, and inject dye into my brain, which I must say was uber painful. Some people say it doesn't hurt. Bullshit! This is when they found my second anuerysm. The big one was 7 mm, so it was determined right then that it had to be repaired. The smaller one is 3 mm so it's currently on observation. So, on that day, I began all my life altering preparations.
On June 22, I worked my last day of both jobs. On June 23, 2016, I had my first brain surgery.
Update (March 20, 2017): I had my second brain surgery in November of 2016. Basically, my memory is shit.