Arachnoid Cyst Back within 6 Month!

You could have pushed me over with a feather! Everything, we thought was going fine. My husband's doctor moved out of state, so we had to find another brain surgeon. We did. Of course they send you for the normal MRI and said it was back! We were standing in the hall looking at a computer. I almost fainted! What do you mean, it's back? The previous doctor said only a small 5% chance of that happening.

Well, we found out then, it's more like a large % chance of it reoccurring. Would have been nice to know the first go around. We could have opted for a shunt to be put in. Now we had to have another BRAIN SURGERY! At least this time, it wasn't a quality of life issue. We had some time to do research. But, still your options are limited. One year later, almost to the day we are doing this again, having Brain Surgery!

Rosey~

The Day of 1st Brain Surgery!

We were stunned that within a week, my husband was having his brain surgery. But, things were just getting worse for him. His cyst was pressing on his cerebellum, which controls your motor functions. At the time of the first scan, it was the size of a package of sugar. After 4-5 hours of surgery, the doctor came out to say everything was O.K. He said it had grown to the size of a lime. That was within about a 2 week period from his first CAT scan. That is about 1/4 the size of you entire brain. You don't have any extra room there, so I was so worried about brain damage.

I made sure to ask the doctor what the chance of this coming back. He said, very minor, like 5%. That sounded pretty good to me. They couldn't get it all, since it was wrapped around an ear nerve, so they had to just poke holes in it, they call it fennastration. Little did we know it would be back within months!

Rosey~

Finding Out You Need Brain Surgery!

After our very frightening experience in the ER and getting no answers, which happened to be on a Sunday, we went to our family physician. Of course, he sent us for all these heart stress tests. My husband almost passed out on the treadmill. Then about a week later after all the tests came back negative, we got "THE CALL". Our physician said he was handing my husband's care over to a neurologist (brain surgeon). So, we made an appointment and went to him the next week. We had a copy of the scan and brought it with us. That was a Monday. All the while my husband's condition is deteriorating. We just didn't know why.

As soon as the doctor pulled up his scan he came back in the room, he was only gone maybe 3 minutes, and said this is what I see, tell me what you see. He said the brain is suppose to be a mirror image on both sides. As we progressed thru the images, you could see this white looking lump appear. He said that's it, an arachnoid cyst! Your husband has to have brain surgery to remove this.

We went home and did what little research we could in 2 days. We even tried to see if there was another doctor we could see for a 2nd opinion. Of course, there wasn't on such short notice. So, we went back on Wednesday to let the Dr. know we agreed to the surgery. We told him what we tried to do about getting a 2nd opinion. But, he said he had already scheduled my husband's surgery for this Friday. It wasn't a matter of "IF" he was having the surgery, but "WHO" was doing it! You could have pushed me over with a feather.

All my husband could do at this point was "thumbs up" , let's do this! He could bearly walk or talk. The cyst was pressing on his cerabellum, the part of the brain that you use for motor skills. My husband was only 40 years old. That was 2 brain surgeries ago! We'll talk about the actual surgery day later.

Rosey~

How it All Began!

We thought my husband was having a heart attack! Spent the next 9 hours in the emergency room. My husband complained about his head hurting him. I kept saying forget about your head, let them work on your heart. They finally did a CAT scan. The ER doctor said they could find nothing wrong with his heart and thought it was just anxiety related. They needed to let us know they found an arachnoid cyst on his scan and said it was probably nothing and had it all his life, but since they found it, we needed to just let our family physician know about it. This was just the beginning of our nightmare!

Rosey~

My mission

Hi, I'm just getting this started. My mission is to raise awareness and let others see how brain surgery affects the lives of not only those who suffer with these ailments, but also those who live with & care for them.