I am 40 years old, from a seaside resort in N. Wales, in the United kingdom. I have a lovely wife, a disabled child, and a new born baby of 4 months.
I was under investigation with my own G.P, for over 2 years, due to tiredness, restless legs, also had strange hearing, and awful sensations through my body. I was about to give up on the hearing problems, and was prepared to live with this, but was scared. My wife forced me to go and get my blood pressure checked, as these hearing and feeling problems where getting worse. "Thank God she did".
As I tried a different doctor, who as a precaution sent me to the ear, nose and throat department in Glan Clwyd Hospital.They then organised a MIR scan for 8th of september 2000. But after having this on the Friday, I was stunned when I received a phone call in work the following day, from the hospital to say we have found a dilated blood vessel in your brain, and we need to take you to Walton Neurological Hospital, in Liverpool straight away. I could not take in what was happening.
My wife when I went home to await the ambulance, could not believe what was happening, and we where all panicking, and very upset, while we where waiting, so I said goodbye to my wife, 2 children, and my mother, and off I went to hospital, with my family following behind.
I then had the hardest 11 days of my life. They had give me a angiogram on the following monday, and told me that is was a very large aneurysm, and were deciding whether to coil this in Oxford, or clip it with surgery. So on the 19th of September, it was decided to coil the aneurysm in Oxford, near London. So they now had to find a bed there, and throughout the previous 11 days, both my wife, 2 children,and my mother stayed in a hotel. I was relieved at this time, that I now at last had something to aim for, as I had been trying to come to terms that I would never see my family again, and would not come out of the surgery.
So at last I arrived in Oxford on Tuesday the 25th of September. They planned the surgery for 8.30am the following day.
The surgery went fine,and they had put in 10 coils. I recovered well after, but my groin was painful. So on Thursday 28th of September, I was sent home, and was told to take aspirin for 2 months, as the aneurysm had blood clots. My groin was still very uncomfortable for some time, and it is now 8 weeks on, and my groin is still not fully recovered. If there is anyone else who has had the same experience, and can tell me when to expect my groin to heal completely, please e-mail me.
I was so lucky in comparison to the other sad stories on this site,and was so pleased to hear about the successful operations.
I do still get scared, mainly at night when trying to sleep, but overall I try and live my life day by day. There was certainly plenty of people wishing me through this, and there is no doubt there was a reason for why this was found before it haemorrhaged.
I would love to hear from anybody who has been through the coiling procedure, and I am hoping that they stay up there, and will update this when I next have my angiogram in 4 months time. Good luck to all of you,and hope you to get through all the difficult times.
Update 2 Jan 2001
I would like to wish all the family a happy new year, and hope it is a good one for all of us.
Sadly for me it has not started very well, as I have had a fall out with my mum and family. I was hoping they may have supported me better during my time of need, but sadly they have not. I find it difficult to accept people who don't real care about anybody but themselves, and this is the case with them. They don't seem to be educated, so therefore cannot understand what I am going through. It is a good job that my wife and kids are here, otherwise it would be very hard to handle. Also having this support site helps. It is a big shame that doctors here in the UK cannot sort out some sort of counselling to help us get through the hard times. How would they feel if they had to cope.
Well no doubt we will keep our chins up.