I would like people to know that it’s important to be your own advocate for your own health, and to really pay attention to their bodies….If I had, I maybe could have prevented the living hell I had to trudge through both emotionally and physically for darn near 10 years.”
“My story is actually one that started months before my rupture in early 2016. I think it’s important to tell this because I think people write these things off like it’s a passing thing and to just forget about it and move on. I was a full time working mom to 3 kids, I didn’t have the luxury of down time. Not a smart move at all.
I woke up one day and noticed one of my eyelids was drooping over my eye which was super weird. As the day progressed, I got a headache that just would not go away and ended up making an appointment at my eye dr to see if they could see what was going on – thinking I had a eye infection or something. They didn’t find anything, but set me up with a Neurology clinic appointment for two weeks into the future. I cancelled the appointment after I got back home.
Fast forward to Father’s day weekend, 2016. I took our two small kids to celebrate fathers day with my dad at the cabin so my husband could have a break. While on the drive back home from the cabin, I lost vision in my right eye and almost crashed my car on the freeway. My vision eventually came back and I continued the drive home. The next day I had the worst sudden headache of my life, like someone hit me in the head with a bat. Then I felt a hot liquid feeling come over my head, like someone dumped hot water on my head. I didn’t pass out, but it took my breath away and I did make my way upstairs to my bed and layed down and texted my husband at work that I didn’t feel right.
He made his way home from work, took me to the local clinic and they sent us to the ER where the nurse told me I was “probably just dehydrated.” I almost left the ER after she said that, because I thought she was right and maybe I was.
Nope.
They did a scan (not sure what kind) and found the two aneurysms and told me to follow up with a Neurologist the next day. Randomly due to a cancellation, I was able to get an appointment the very next day and drove (yes, I drove myself) to the appointment.
I was immediately sent over to the adjoining hospital, admitted to the ICU, and prepped for scans and eventually surgery the next a.m.. I didn’t know that during this time, due to the bleed, I had also suffered a stroke. I didn’t even know about the stroke, and apparently neither did the doctors because they never did an MRI afterwards. I found out about the stroke 6 months ago in 2025 after an MRI found it because I was about to undergo a shoulder surgery and they wanted to make sure I was ok as I had been having a ton of headaches. Now, only almost 10 years later and all of my pain and agony and wondering why my recovery was taking so long, why couldn’t I walk normally, why was I having memory issues and coordination problems and emotional outbursts.
It was all clear now….only took almost 10 years to get an explanation.
I do want to add that My 9-year-old son ended up having an epileptic seizure a few years ago and while they were scanning him they wanted to know family history. I told them mine and they ended up finding that he also has an aneurysm. His is small and they are watching it for now, he gets regular scans and we believe he is in good hands. It’s scary because I know what I went through and that is not something I want for him.
