As you know, my recent MRI was on April 10th. The one prior to that was October 25th. Unexpectedly, I got the MRI report/results in the mail on Saturday. I wish I had my scanner hooked up so I could just post it on here for you. Basically in a nutshell it said there was no change. Things seem stable yet I have to admit that I sometimes block out or get carried away on a fantasty and forget what is going on in my head.
I have a small confession: Last week (maybe Wednesday) I peaked at the few films I managed to talk the tech into making for me. The first ones seemed not bad but then I got into the nit and grit of it. For some reason I had forgotten about the other tumors and was just thinking I had one. Maybe because we are just focusing on one. I mean of course I knew there were more but I was only thinking of two others. When I looked at the film, the image of my brain looked as if someone dropped blotches of white paint all over it (some of them looking rather large). I saw my distorted brainstem and the tumors mushroomed out around it.
Now this is nothing new, but I just forgot how it looked and was expecting to see a near clean brain. I have to admit the image sent a shiver of horror down my spine and I had to quickly put it away and try to forget it. You know the say "Curiousity killed the cat". Well I did not want to be THAT cat!
Even though my brain is a scary site it is all good.
I saw the eye doctor in March and he said my optic nerves are now stable and not swelling. Thus he took me off of the Diamox medication that I have been on for a year. I recall going off just before my trip to Michigan. My instructions were to monitor my condition. If I had really bad headaches I would need to start the medicine again.
While I may have had a mild headache the first day or two, I don't recall having any on my trip. However, last friday the headaches began. It is hard for me to monitor and know what would be a headache due to the brain tumors or something like an allergy. I had one every morning which generally came between the hours of 4 and 5 am. Thinking back now, I guess they were pretty bad and interupted my sleep. I have been nursing them with IB profen thinking it is just and adjustment period off the medication.
Yesterday I got a really bad one that was one heck of a migrane! (The others I thought might have been because it was dry in the house and I got too dried out while I was sleeping.) It happened after my run. I ran the furthest I have fun since before my treatment in 2004. I just felt like running. It was really hard because I was kind of stiff but I just kept going.
Originally I was thinking that I would run out far and walk back. Yet when I got to the turning point, I realized I was going to have to run back in order to get the truck home in time for Harley to go to work. I ran nearly the whole distance but allowed myself enough time for a 10-15 minute cool down walk. The total time I was gone was for an hour. When I jumped in my truck and started driving home, a searing pain jabbed at my sinus cavity, then the back of my head, and then behind my right eye. It was so bad that when I stopped at the mailbox, I threw up black puke which scared me even more!
I had not eaten in 6 hours and only had one meal. Thus I scarfed a couple large spoonfuls of cottage cheese so I could down some excedrin and get relief. While going to the bathroom, I burped black barf and cottage cheese on myself again. I spoke to my mom on the computer and within a half hour the headache seemed to dissipate and the odd black vomit no longer returned.
For my appointment tomorrow I need to remember these incidences so that I can inform the doctor. For most of the week I had headaches that occured in the early morning. I have also had nose bleeds (had one today) which I thought was attributed to the dryness in the house. On the flipside, my nose runs like a dang sieve while outside running or walking. It actually started to drip Tuesday at class and I could not feel it. A classmate pointed it out to me and I was unsure if it had started bleeding again. I also had a mild headache and felt somewhat nauseated and uncomfortable as a passenger in the carpool ride to Seattle on Tuesday. Yet it was a warm day and the sun was bearing down on me (I used to get carsick as a kid in the same scenario).
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