Risky Business
29 April 2009, 15:29
I drove today, one week shy of being officially “allowed” to drive since the aneurysm.
I thought I may have been a little panicky whilst driving but it was absolutely fine – I was hyper vigilant and careful. It did make me wonder though, whether people who’d had a burst aneurysm and/or stroke (a burst aneurysm being a kind of stoke, I guess) should have to take a medical or an abridged driving test before being allowed to drive again.
I mean, I was (very) lucky I had no deficits, cognitive or motor, but what if I had some minor ones that made it a little tricky to drive? What if I were confused about which were my left and which were my right side or if I’d had residual peripheral blindness? I might have exercised a self-imposed ban on driving, but I wouldn’t be required to. And who am I to question, given I let myself out on the road a few days early? Do I call myself arrogant, or just really desperate to have that freedom that driving gives me?
Permanent Link | CommentsTo know or not to know?
25 April 2009, 18:21
As I mentioned in a previous post, I’d had headaches leading up to the aneurysm but didn’t get them checked out. McG and I were talking about this and whether actually having a CAT scan and the aneurysm diagnosed before it burst would have necessarily been an advantageous thing.
Look, I know I could have bloody-well died, was very lucky that I didn’t die and obviously waiting until it burst wasn’t ideal (it’s not as if it’s like finding out the gender of your unborn child), but, you know, everything was over so fast – it burst, I was in an ambulance, getting a CAT scan and having surgery within 24 hours of Mount Annie erupting – because it was over so quickly (save the interminable recovery period), I didn’t really have time to think about it, to think about potentially dying on the operating table. It simply had to be done.
If annie had been diagnosed beforehand and there had been humming and hahing about “Should I have the surgery?” (as it was so close to a major artery they wouldn’t have coiled it either, it would have been a full-blown craniotomy), “Would I be OK walking around with a timebomb in my head for god knows how long?” or “Would surgery even be imperative?”, the anxiety would have been unbearable.
If, in fact, it had been diagnosed at all. When I had the CT scan at the hospital, they couldn’t see the aneursym. The only reason they knew it had to be there somewhere was because of the bleed. The angiogram revealed the secret little sucker, but if I’d complained of headaches, how likely would they have sent me for an angiogram if a CT scan had been clear???
I am an immediate person. I like to get things out of the way now. Anticipation is not something I enjoy – enduring a necessary pro and con dialogue inside my head is tantamount to Chinese water torture. So, in a way, I’m glad it all happened suddenly with no warning. At least if I’d died, I wouldn’t have known any different and I wouldn’t have spent months wondering, pondering and panicking.
Heavy. Sorry about that.
Permanent Link | Comments [1]Famous Company
21 April 2009, 19:42
I recently became curious about “famous” people who have burst brain aneurysms, figuring that given 0.0001% of the population burst an annie every year, surely there had to be a few prodigal sons and daughters amongst them? My research uncovered the following (in chronological order):
Anne Baxter, an Academy Award winning actress, died of a burst aneurysm in 1985 while walking down Madison Avenue.
Quincy Jones got swept up in his own private hurricane annie in the 70s and can no longer play the trumpet (apparently it could potentially dislodge the chip in his brain). I guess such a brain bleed could explain a lot of things. Such as Michael Jackson.
In 1995 Bill Berry, once the drummer for R.E.M, collapsed on stage during a show from a brain aneurysm. He recovered and rejoined the band, but left for good in October 1997.
Sharon Stone had a mild aneurysm in 2001 that required no treatment.
Laura Branigan died in 2004 of a brain aneurysm in her sleep after having complained about severe headaches for 2 weeks leading up to her death. She was 47 years old.
Neil Young survived a burst aneurysm in 2005, and had it coiled. [Coiling is the minimally-invasive way of treating aneurysms via angiogram – the surgeons decided not to coil my aneurysm as it was too close to a major artery so I got a ticket to the skull opening special.]
Teri Garr got the ultimate bum deal – being diagnosed with MS in the 80s and then bursting an aneurysm in 2006. She survived.
The most interesting one for me was Patricia Neal, the actress and one-time wife of Roald Dahl who was a heavy smoker (tsk tsk) and in 1965, burst three (3!) cerebral aneurysms while pregnant, and was in a coma for three weeks. She later gave birth to a healthy girl, Lucy.
I found this interesting as I had already pondered the potential ramifications of having burst my own annie had I been pregnant (as we’d been trying mid last year so this could have been a real possibility). I had come to the conclusion that it would have been very dire indeed, with the initial fall, pumped full of general anaesthetic and hardcore painkillers and a compromised ability to “bounce back” from such a life-changing event – surely that would have affected an unborn child?
Apparently Not.
Returning to the scene of the crime
16 April 2009, 11:18
This morning, McG and I went to say Thank you to Phil from Bunnings. I thought returning to the place (piece of floor, actually) where I came to, heaving my guts up like a true Regan, might have been confronting, but it really wasn’t. Although I had spent many weeks reliving the moment I came out of the concussion on the floor, headlong into a fog of pain, knowing instinctively that something was wrong, I had managed to get things into perspective and work through those moments over the past few months. It was a bit like saying hello (and F you!) to an old toxic friend whose vindictiveness and poisonous jibes no longer had any emotional affect on me. Liberating, that was. Yes.
I had absolutely no recollection of what Phil looked like (too intent was I on the crazed vortex that was my brain at the time) so it was a bit odd talking to someone I didn’t recognise who knew exactly what I’d been through (and looked like – shudder) that day.
Anyone who knows me knows I’m not a particularly demonstrative person, but I had to give the man a big hug and it didn’t even feel weird! He was a genuinely nice, humble ex-cop who gave a fresh new meaning to the phrase “I’ve just been Bunningsed”...
Bafflement and Joy
14 April 2009, 09:45
Our Easter Weekend was… average. Highs and lows. McG and I were both sick with chest infections so tolerance was low and Scout was… unpredictable.
The best part was Easter Sunday and the Easter Hunt. Da Bunny left a trail of his white cottontails from Scout’s room to the backdoor where there were hidden eggs for her to find. Seeing the joy on her face when she found an egg was a most marvelous thing. Although I don’t think she was impressed when I mentioned the eggs were to be rationed so she couldn’t scoff the whole lot in one sitting (which I’m sure she would if she could!)
**********
Scout’s routine is pretty much back to normal these days. I’m still home in the mornings obviously but everything else pretty much runs the same as it did before Annie blew her stack.
She was reportedly a handful while I was in the Hospital. Massive uber-tantrums every night (ramping up the “scream like a cat being slaughtered”), telling Beaupa (my dad) that she “didn’t like him”, not believing McG when he reassured her that Mummy would be home soon. The spiel was that mummy was having a sleepover at the Hospital for awhile and that shed be home soon but one night Scout insisted “No! No! She’s NOT coming home, she’s NOT”. That broke my heart into itsy bitsy pieces, that one.
Having Nana and Beaupa in the house would have confused her as well, assuming that she associates them with me. Why are they here and Mum is not?
McG is definitely reaping the rewards of being the main “parent” and dealing with the emotional collateral, though. Scout is very much her Daddy’s Girl now and will call for Dad in the middle of the night rather than me. It makes me a bit sad but know that it’s totally understandable and he deserves to be numero uno in her eyes at the moment, given all that he has done for her.
Breeding Sickness
9 April 2009, 20:11
Ugh. Have Respiratory Tract Infection. Antibiotics suck. Nausea, vomiting. Am so fucking sick of feeling sick. Have G.P with no sense of humour. When she asked me why I was on such heavy duty painkillers, I responded plainly “Burst aneurysm. Brain Surgery. You know, the usual…” and was met with not even a flurry of smile. Honestly, though, read my file. And for god’s sake, cultivate a sense of the ridiculous.
On the brighter side:
1. I’ve managed to get my Pain relief down to 5mg Oxycontin and 4 Panadeine Fortes a day (down from 20mg and 8 a day).
2. Maisies have taken bait and been seen now’t of this past week.
3. Will be back at work next Tuesday. Actually, I’m not sure whether that can be considered truly a bright side given I’ll be starting a super-new role on a topic I know virtually nothing about – Remuneration and Rewards. Will my aneurysed brain be up to the intellectual challenge?
My (new) boss is Legend, though, asking me what kind of working situation would be ideal for me at first, with a mantra of “We’ll make it work”. I’ll be working 4 hours a day on the 4 days I work, 3 of them at home so I can space my short bursts of computer use over the day. Oh Happy. Happy Day.
Permanent Link | Comments [2]An Eli Stone Moment
4 April 2009, 22:08
A couple of weeks ago I started seeing things in my peripheral vision. Pieces of paper would fly off the desk, eerie shadows would appear in the lounge room and the worst – I was seeing Maisies everywhere in the corner of my eye.
We’ve only ever had Maisies in the kitchen, never anywhere else (they “live” behind the oven in Autumn). One afternoon (yes, OK, while watching Dr. Phil) I “saw” a Maisy dash from our bedroom behind the bookcase in the hallway about 12 feet away. I ran down to where I’d seen it and nothing. I saw another in the lounge room under another couch and again, nothing. Either they were the speediest mice in the universe or we had the mice vortex opening up in the floorboards. I never saw one directly so I thought I was going bonkers.
I told my G.P and he asked me if I was hearing voices or feeling paranoid – like I was being watched (I joked no, apart from my husband – he didn’t laugh). I kind of scoffed “Of course not!” but then it hit me that hallucinations could actually be a reality for me. G.P surmised that it was probably the morphine that was causing it and recounted a patient who saw (and talked to) fairies on her bed whilst on the drug. I felt a bit cheated then. I wanted one up on my daughter…
I had bloody well being seeing mice the whole time. I wasn’t having hallucinations at all. But I can sure as hell spot a Maisy from 20 feet now. Those mice have no chance. I have super peripheral vision.
Somehow I don’t think this was on the list when they were giving out superpowers.
