I am a 46 year old female, non-smoker, with no family history of annies. I do take meds for highnblood pressure and its under control. I woke up on July 11th, 2012 and I was about to get up to take a shower when a sudden wave of pain started from my neck and rolled throughout my head. It was excruciating. I am prone to migraines however this was beyond anything I had ever felt before. I called my husband and he suggested I have one of my kids take me to ER. I hung up and talked to my daughter but then I decided to take ibuprofen and try to sleep it off. I woke up again and it was worse and I began vomiting. The kids had already left so I drove myself about 15 miles to my doctors office. She gave me pain and anti-nausea meds then called the imaging department at the hospital and told them I needed a CT immediately. The doctor explained to me they had found something but they were unsure what it was so they were going to airlift me to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle. At Harborview they did a contrast CT then explained they had found an aneurysm and it was leaking. They said I needed an angiogram to give them a roadmap for brain surgery to clip it. This was all very shocking to me but I knew I had no choice. Dr. Sekhar and his team performed the surgery the following morning which took about 8 hours. It was very successful and I woke up in recovery remembering everything and able to move my arms, legs, etc… They kept me in Neuro-ICU for two weeks. After 10 days they performed a cranioplasty to replace my skull piece that had been left off for swelling.
During my time in ICU and for about 10 days afterwards, I was in a lot of pain in my hips and lower back. My head was fine, no headaches. After ICU I went to acute care for a couple days. I passed all the PT, OT, and speech tests and I was discharged and sent home. The doctors and nurses encouraged me to stretch and walk. I began walking the next day and resting as much as I needed. This week I am up to three miles on my walks. Prior to this event, I ran/walked 4-5 miles per day. I am a non-smoker and in good physical shape. I go in on September 5th for a follow up and CT with Dr. Sekhar. I plan to return to work the following day. I feel great and incredibly fortunate to be doing so well.
My biggest fear is that this will happen again but I hope I can let that go and keep moving forward.