22 September 2003
Hi My name is Kathy. At 37 I had a right internal carotid artery aneurysm and was operated on 1-09-91. I was at doctors offices or emergency rooms for approx. 20 years off and on prior to this and was told I was having migraine headaches, go home take a pill and go to sleep! I would go home and do as they said, in a dark room, no sound and cry myself to sleep.
Through the years on numerous occasions I would loose my vision, have slurred speech and be paralyzed on the left side. I couldn't pick any thing up or if I tried to walk I would fall. It would look like clouds were floating by and my speech sounded like a foreign language when I spoke. STROKE SIGNS, YES. TIA's YES! They would last any where from 5 minutes to 2 hours. After each episode I would not have all my memory back. Here I was having blood leaks from the aneurysm that were damaging my brain cells.
I never had any test done while I was having these spells, it was always after an episode. I would go right to emergency but by the time they did all they had to do the aneurysm must have deflated or shrink and it wasn't detected. I lost segments of my life. I look at photos and do not know anything about them. Family and friends talk about things we did and I don't know what they were talking about. I remember things way back in grade school, there are just segments of time missing. Yes, it did worry me but the doctors said they were migraines, who was I to question them. I would go for a few months to a few years with no episodes.
The first time something happened I was about 18. I was working in a Fotomat booth in the middle of a mall at Christmas, water fountains were making noise, Christmas music playing and people talking etc. My area boss sat on a bench and was watching me, she came over and started yelling at me for ignoring customers. I started crying because I couldn't see or talk, off to the hospital. It was blamed on stress and migraines. I didn't have a headache! Heck ya, I was stressed who looses there eyesight and speech! I did grow up having migraines but it seems that when I had these attacks as I call them, I never had a headache. Sometimes I would see Indian like patterns floating across my vision. I now know that these are called eye migraines.
Once when I used a Vicks inhaler I had the same things happen, I sat and rocked myself to sleep. The first and only time I went to play racket ball at the spa with my boyfriend, I went in a dry heat eucalyptus room and then went to play. Hello, All I saw were clouds floating by. Ralph kept saying hit the ball. What ball! I lost my speech and movement of my left side. I wouldn't let him take me to the hospital then because it was always the same thing! Cat Scan and the results were Migraines. Follow up with your doctor in two days. Doc said "I read about people playing racket ball before, you are in a closed room breathing in your own carbon monoxide (or dioxide I forget) that is probably what happened to you"
The big one happened on Jan. 1, 1991 My best friend Cathy and I worked for an airline where we did most of the indoor work, counter, security etc. When we went into security, I was running the xray machine and it felt like someone put their camera right up to my eyes and flashed it. I remember turning to the security guard and my friend and saying "Why did he do that". They couldn't understand my speech or what I was trying to say but knew something was terribly wrong. They took me in the backroom until the flight left. Cathy left to help customers. I was by myself, I tried to get up to get a drink and got stuck leaning over and holding onto a desk. I couldn't move I must have stayed that way for 1/2 hour. Ambulance was called and some old story Cat Scan and migraine. Follow up with your doctor in two days.
My mom was in Denver on vacation. Ralph my boy friend and his mom said go to the doctors and I said "NO, he will only say the same thing he always says". Well, they convinced me to go. He told me he wanted me tested for MS and to go and get my cat scan results at the hospital and go directly to Dr. Chandler Kolhi's office. Only thing I knew about this Dr. was that I had a little brother die at 8 yrs old of a brain tumor and he was his doctors partner. Dr. Kohli order a another cat scan and arteriogram, I think that's what it called. Had the arteriogram done the next morning at 7 am, went home at noon. I had been laying in the hospital bed in a fetal position in pain and they sent me home! The doctor said that he had to go out of town for 3 days and he would read the results when he came back on Monday.
That night my mom stayed with me. BOOM another attack the WORST I ever had. I felt like my head was going to blow off from pain. I didn't want to worry my mom so I went in my bedroom and tried to call my family doctor. The lady who answered the phone couldn't understand me and hung up. I came out of my room and told my mom to leave I was going to go to bed. She argued to no avail and left. She went to a phone booth and called my boyfriend he came right over and took me to the hospital. On the way I tried to open the car door and jump out, all I wanted to do was crash my head on the road so the pain would stop. He held the door shut while going 70 MPH and I opened the window and started crawling out, Oops, he pulled he back in.
I never saw a hospital emergency room work so fast! They found I had an allergic reaction to the iodine used in the arteriogram. Lo and behold Dr. Kohli hadn't left yet and he came to read the results. He said I had a brain aneurysm and if I left the hospital I probably wouldn't make it back or if I waited to make a decision it would be to late. This was at 10 PM. A BRAIN ANEURYSM! What the heck is that. By the look on my mom and Ralph's faces I knew it was serious. Doc said I would have a horseshoe cut on my right temple. Surgery would be the next morning at 7 AM. Family came right up and we made a circle and said a prayer with the priest. The priest called me GLADYS, put his hand on my head and said a prayer. I felt a warm feeling come over me and heard my deceased grandmother say " Don't worry Kathy I will be with you". Mom stayed with me during the night.
The priest came back in the middle of the night and said he was sorry he realized he had called me GLADYS. The lady who was in the same bed earlier that day had the same last name and there was a mix up. WHAT? He had come back to anoint my head with oil. LAST RIGHTS! OH NO! THIS IS SERIOUS. I never heard of a aneurysm, I had no idea what it was. All I ask the Dr. is if it would hurt.
I called my three best friends during the night and left them messages on their answering machines. I told them "Thank you for being my friend and that I may not be alive tomorrow". Duh!
Surgery: supposed to last 2 hrs, lasted 6. The aneurysm burst while they were prepping me. I died and was revived! I awoke in the recovery room opened my eyes and saw double. My optical nerves were stretched during surgery. Eye patch, dizziness, drains in both temples, bandages etc., etc. I must have look a sight. The doctor came in my room one morning days later, took the bandages off, turned around and said he would have someone come in to clean the mess.
You know in movies how you see them reach for a mirror. That was me. I crawled to the end of the bed and found one in the tray thingy. Looked at myself and started screaming at the top of my lungs. "Freddy Kruger got me, Freddy Kruger got me" and I never even watched one of these movies. Instead of a horseshoe scar I had a scar from my inner right eyebrow to right below my right ear. It looked like a railroad track of staples. NO HAIR! and a patch. Pirate Kathy at your service! My poor mom was walking up the hall and heard me screaming.
Twelve days of hospital life and NEVER getting out of bed. I was released to go home. I cried all the time for no reason. I would be laughing and start crying at the same time. What happened to the old Kathy? She was gone. I was happy go lucky. But a type A personality is not good and that is what I HAD. I always remembered numbers and names etc. Sounds were louder, smells enhanced. I wasn't me.
No REHAB! My family doctor forgot to write the orders. Shame on him, the jerk! For those of you who don't know this, once the surgeon is finished with the surgery, your care is left to your family doctor so you better have a good one. Meds galore! Depression the doctor said. Take this pill. Oops that pill isn't working take this one. I wasn't depressed I was glad to be alive. I did go back to the surgeon and he told me the crying and enhanced smell were from where the aneurysm was located.
I found MYSELF a great speech pathologist to learn to pronounce words right and for memory, a psychologist to help me learn to live with the new me and to get that type A personality down to a B type and stroke support group with open hearts, ears and arms. I wouldn't let anyone go with me I had to do it alone. Drive me there and pick me up was all I ask. Once there I cried for me and the person I wasn't anymore. I couldn't even remember that milk went on cereal. Pirate Kathy went shopping with my mom and a little boy said "Mom, Look at the pirate" poor lady was so embarrassed, I just smiled.
Lucky I had a great eye doctor (DR. PAUL MAHAR). He told me after about 2 months that if I didn't take off the eye patch I would train my brain to see double. He said "I don't know what religion you are but I think you should start praying". Little did he know I was putting Holy Water on my eye all the time. But, I couldn't go with out my patch I was too dizzy and would get sick. We drove from Youngstown to Cincinnati and back on Easter Sunday, I took my patch off. What a trip, traffic all the way. I had double traffic. On the way home my vision came together. Double vision and short term memory were real problems for me. Now, I only have double vision when I'm tired, when I wake up or when I'm laying on my right side. I do have a dark thin line through my vision on the right eye and a couple floaters.
If it wasn't for the iodine reaction I would not be here today. The nurses and doctors were all coming to my room and telling us it is a miracle I lived. I have been to the Cleveland Clinic a few times in the last 12 1/2 years with all my records and the same thing there when a Doctor reads my records. MIRACLE. I say that DR. Kohli, Dr. Mahar and the medical team at St. Elizabeth Hospital are the MIRACLES without them I wouldn't be here.
It's been about 12 years and 8 months and if it wasn't for Ralph, my family, the people in my stroke support group, my speech pathologist and psychologist I wouldn't be the person I am now. Not the same person, a lot of that girl was lost. I think I listen more and the petty things aren't as important. I take one day at a time. I couldn't return to work because of my short term memory. I did try and it just doesn't work. I can do things my way but it is VERY hard to to remember and follow instructions.
It did take a long time to get where I am today. Heck this narrative took me 6 hours to write today. I've look at these pages and read others stories but, I just couldn't relive the past. Guess what I skipped a lot of the story to make it shorter but tried to list the important things to look for. I should be glowing for all the cat scans that never found the aneurysm and I was told I was born with it. Another thing a lot of us we with METAL clips were never told. YOU CAN NOT HAVE A MRI. The magnets, I'm told, will pull the clip off. My doctor couldn't remember what kind of clip he used because it was not a planned surgery and it wasn't written on any charts. I had a post-op aneurysm check up in 1995 and that's when I was sure it was metal.
Good Luck and thanks for reading my narrative (MY story) it feels good finally being able to talk about most of it.
© Copyright 2003 Kathy Baird
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