…and then, there’s Fred

I had just prepped the first stage of tonight’s dinner, hoping to get a head start. The two to three hour cooking time left me pressed for the day. Why I would have a taste for short ribs at 9 o’clock this morning is beyond me (No. I’m not pregnant, wise ass). At least the Husband will have a solid doggie bag to bring to work tonight.

And then Fred chimed in.

He has a big mouth lately.

A real butinsky.

You ever have that feeling that someone is hovering, you know, trying not to be noticed? Yeah. I had that feeling back in November.

Enter Fred.

Well, let me give you a little back story.

I hadn’t been feeling myself, had a little episode a few weeks before Turkey day when I was doing dishes at the sink. Lost my focus, couldn’t shake it off. Turned to walk into the dining room a foot away, and couldn’t walk straight. Heading into the living-room by holding onto the china cabinet on the way in, I sat on the couch. Early Sunday morning, everyone was still sleeping, so I just laid there. Shut my eyes for a bit and a few hours later Mike woke me. My head was thumping. Didn’t think much of it, but made an appointment with the M.D the next day. I am, as much as I hate to admit it, getting old. Time to check the oil in this jalopy.

Having worked for a family practice physician for over a decade, I went in to my appointment with the back room knowledge of what the routine tests would be, and what would be paying for her Tory Burch loafers. I was having none of that. I was a relatively new patient to Dr. Jennifer ( she is my age, so I add the title out of respect for the amount of schooling she’s obviously surpassed me with). So when I tell her my symptoms , we both agree to have an MRI/ MRA of my brain to see if I have one. She tells me my pressure is too high, we go over my diet and non- existent exercise routine and make a plan to talk when the results come in.

I still felt ‘off” in the weeks that followed, and the headaches persisted. So I scheduled an appointment with a neurologist near my office just to be sure. Let me tell you about that guy.

He must have been practicing since the early 60’s, and still wore the uniform of a Navy blue suit jacket and tie. His pinky ring shined brighter than the chrome on a ’55 Bel Air. His grey hair perfectly sculpted to his crown with what my father would call shellac. Big, toothy, Polident smile, he shakes my hand. I give him the “job interview handshake” just so I know I have his attention. We pass through the formalities; height, weight, age. We get to the “what brings you here” stage and I tell him. “ I’m ‘off’.” He gives me the up and down and thinks on this for a minute. Or, he was thinking his coffee was getting cold. Or that the crypt keeper in the waiting room was going to take up the rest of his afternoon, I ‘m not sure. Anyway, I produce the disk of my recent MRA and tell him about the headaches. As he pops it in, he tells me it’s probably hormonal. Great. My hormones have been the cause of every malady I’ve ever experienced since I was 14 years old. If he were around, my father would confirm that. “It’s your ovaries.” he’d say, as I bind my broken radius together with duct tape.

Dr. Polident looks over the written report of the MRA, which the radiologist said had no significant abnormalities, and again says it’s most likely perimenopausal migraine. He cues up the images of my brain (see Daddy, I do have one) and skims over the crystal clear images. Nope. Nada. Niente. He looks at his gold Citizen watch and tells me he’ll send me for an EEG (a test that uses tiny electrodes to see if there are any abnormal electrical charges from the activity in brain cells), to make the appointment with the girl up front. He looks at his watch again, heads for the door. I clutch the paper gown tightly around my midsection with one hand, and offer my free hand to him as he exits. “ Nice to meet you, we’ll be in touch.” And out he goes. With plenty of time for a new hot cup of coffee before he attends to the crypt keeper in exam room #3.

So that was that. It was my ovaries.

Until I suffered a mild TIA Thanksgiving night.

Yep. A “mini stroke”. That’s what the neurologist at Luthern Hospital said I’d had that holiday evening. We had a fabulous turkey dinner with my in-laws in Staten Island, came home watched a movie on the couch with our buttons open, and relished a day well spent. I went up to use the bathroom and BAM!! It hit me again. I couldn’t see right. Everything went blurry and as I tried to cross the landing to the stairs calling down to Jimmy, I couldn’t walk straight. I was leaning to the right like a sailor on shore-leave. Blurred vision, unsteady gait, and this time, numbness in the right side of my face. Oh boy. “I’m coming Elizabeth!” Here we go..

Thank God Jimmy drove me to the Emergency room, because left to my own devices, on a holiday no less, I would have avoided it like the plague. And quite possibly could have stroked out on my second floor landing. Or not. All I can say is, that man has saved me from myself in so many ways I’ve lost track. I’m a lucky broad. I am however, going to skip over that whole scene; If anyone in Brooklyn has ever been to Lutheran on a holiday evening, you know with out my play by play what that experience was like. Instead, lets all get to know me a little more, shall we? I’m impatient with medical staff. Always have been. I’ve been on every side of the clip board imaginable, I tend to cut right to the chase. I expect everyone else to do the same. I am often disappointed.

I finally get in a room on the stroke unit and settle in. My partner in all things, except hospital room- visitor’s chair- sleeping, goes home to get some rest. His promise to return the next day with the cd of my recent MRA and some real coffee gives me some respite from the ice chips I’ve been sucking on. God, how I love that man. And coffee. During the night, my room mate, Mrs. Gallagher, expired. And no one noticed. I was livid. I may or may not have made a scene. It’s a little foggy. I’ll tell you one thing, every one on that floor paid close attention to my room for the next three days.

Hooked up to a holter monitor, having been evaluated by every type of pathologist in the Kingdom of Science, they order a new MRA with contrast. I’m starving and short tempered, but agree. What the hell, I was here already, right? Four hours later, cold, hungry and armed with the revelation that my new friend Mark the Technician and I have the same birthday, I head into the tube that will once again scan my grey matter. And it breaks! No fooling. It breaks down with me hooked up to it. I hop off the table, IV bag in hand and use the phone on my buddy Mark’s desk to call my husband. “ Get me out of here.”

Fortunately for them, they were able to obtain enough clear evidence of my brain to make a diagnosis.

Enter Fred.

Having made a comparison of my cd with the new MRA, it was confirmed. It was clearly not my ovaries. Dr. Liff, the unit’s vascular neurologist solemnly relayed to my husband and I that I had an aneurysm in my brain. It was evident on the original MRA, and showed quite clearly on the new one. He waited for a response.

I hear myself, the MonaLisa Vito of aneurysms, explain to the good doctor my experience with this particular diagnosis. My older sister had one. She was one of the first in Manhattan to have an endovascular embolization back in the early 90’s. My mother had one. Twice. The first in her abdominal aortic arch that was fixed in 2010 and the second , a 9 mm thoracic aortic aneurysm that didn’t kill her , but the cancer they couldn’t surgically remove because of the 17 hour surgery to repair the aneurysm, did. I’m well aware, thank you very much. Now clear me to go home. He stood there, looking back and forth between my husband and myself, and called for a nurse to remove my IV. He made me promise to follow up with the staff neuro surgeon, and I of course offer him my first born if he would JUST LET ME OUT OF THERE.

So we went home and did some research.

I can’t really remember what went on in those next few days, but I can tell you this: A lot goes on in the mind of a woman as she’s driving to work.

I was a relatively new bride, I was just beginning to like my teenage sons. I had finally gotten to the point in my job where I felt comfortable to jokingly tell my boss when she’s being a royal bitch. I had to get my truck inspected. Christmas was coming. WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU MEAN I HAVE AN ANEURYSM IN MY BRAIN? The panic attack I was having at eight o’clock in the morning on Kings Highway would surely kill me before my brain exploded. I can’t die on my way to work, I didn’t shave my legs. Now I know why my mother always told us to wear clean drawers, it’s so that in the event we were hit by a bus, the ER people would know we had a good mother.

Alright, I got control of myself. Arrived at work that Monday and proceeded to find a Vascular neurosurgeon in Manhattan. Of course, my husband was at home doing the very same thing. Have I said how much I love that man? I found a guy at Columbia Presbyterian, named Robert Solomon. I called my husband. He had already found him and liked him too. Top guy. Head of his field. Can perform the surgery in his sleep. There was even a couple of YouTube videos. You Tube videos. Technology is either a blessing or a curse. I watched all the videos. Compared them to the images I had of my own cranium, and decided he was “ The Guy”. Here he is.

Dr.Robert Soloman aka The Guy

I called up Doctor Polident when I got home from work and told him to look over my brain scan again. Begrudgingly, he did. Then I told him of the 4mm right MCA aneurysm an over worked, underpaid resident in the ER found the previous weekend. His reply? “Oh boy, that’s going to need surgery.” I called him out on his incompetence, his disdain for his chosen profession and very eloquently told him to go fuck himself. We had an appointment with Dr. Robert Solomon within the week.

This is the part of the story where Fred takes on a life of his own. He becomes solidified.

Fred , becomes Fred.

It was a sunny December day when we made the drive into Manhattan to see Dr. Solomon. I was more anxious than a Greyhound at the gate waiting for a glimpse of that jackrabbit. Thankfully, as a woman who had found sobriety some years ago, I had a few tricks up my sleeve to quell the storm. But it wasn’t easy. When we pulled into the parking garage, I knew my husband was on the same page. This is serious. He never pays for parking. Ever. We made light of the elevator ride up by cracking jokes and being goofy. Laughter really is the best medicine.

When we were called into his office, I already had the discs in my hand for his review. We sat facing him and waited. “This guy looks like Lurch” I thought. I looked over to my husband and knew instinctively that he was thinking the same thing. We smiled at each other. He was very calm, almost soothing. He asked why I was there. I purged my story and waited for his reply as he popped in my cd and looked it over. “ Ah, yes. There it is.”

This is what he saw.

Right there, very clearly in the left side of this image, is what he called a middle cerebral aneurysm. It’s located in a’good spot” behind my right eye. a little balloon of blood branching off of my artery. It’s small in size, 4mm ( about the size of a pearl ) and wasn’t a risk for rupture. “Fuck that. Get it out.” was what I wanted to say. Instead, I asked my options. Given my familial history, he said he could either clip it with a small titanium clip or wait and watch. He sat quietly as I became MonaLisa Vito once again. I explained my father’s terrible vascular history, my sister’s coiling and both of my mother’s corrective surgeries. He was impressed. Or annoyed, I really couldn’t estimate his reaction due to his Lurchish facial expression. I took a deep breath. Jimmy shot off a few questions. The doctor was confidant that I would make the best decision for myself. We would either do the clipping, or wait and re-scan in six months to check for growth. He didn’t push. Here I thought he was going to wheel me off into a sterilized room right then and there, but he didn’t. Jimmy & I were both relieved. We left the office with a handshake and a plan: We would re-scan in three months and take it from there. I told you I was impatient …as we retrieved our car, I finally exhaled.

I’d love to say that in the weeks that followed I’d relaxed somewhat. I couldn’t. I still felt “off”. I was still getting headaches behind my right eye, smells were excruciating at times. When Jimmy would see my scowl, he knew I wasn’t feeling well. One evening at dinner, he asked if I was alright, and I replied: “No. Fred’s been blabbering all day. “ He looked at me. Brandon put his fork down. Mike, well, Mike said “pass the string beans”. “Fred. You know, the aneurysm.” ” You named it?” Brandon asked. Yes. I named it. For me it took away the scary scientific sterility of the problem. It became more tangible. A more reasonable opponent. I mean really, when I hear the name Fred my mind goes automatically to Mr. Rodgers. Tell me, would a man that plays with puppets and loves his mailman ever make you cower in fear? Nope . Me neither. That night I promised this thing, this squatter in my grey matter would not scare me. I tried to keep that promise.

By the time March rolled around, I had had more bad days than good. It was pretty clear to me that my emotional state was just not going to allow for a “wait and see” attitude. I knew the risk of Fred blowing were slim, but I knew if he did, it could kill me. The thought of leaving my fairly new husband alone to finish molding my sons into the men they were becoming was overwhelming. I needed to be around. There was too much more left for me to do with them. They still left hair in the shower drain. I scheduled the follow up MRA with the pretty solid idea that I would have the surgery. I told Jimmy and the boys how I felt.

The follow up MRA was complete, and the good news was that Fred wasn’t any larger. He wasn’t any smaller, either. And, he wasn’t just going to go away. I decided to have the clipping surgery. We told Dr. Solomon and expected he’d want to whisk me off into the operating room that very day. No dice. He was going on vacation. I had to tell my job. I wanted the boys to finish out the school year. We would have to wait until June.

And now, here it is. June . Tomorrow I’ll be admitted into Columbia Presbyterian to have an angiogram so that my brain can be mapped out. Tuesday The Good Doctor will have hopefully arrived to work sans traffic, a little pep in his step, and a song in his heart. He will then use a sawzall to bore a hole in my skull, drain a little fluid that my brain floats in, and clip that fucker Fred so that he shrinks. So much has happened in between. I have to point out that I have the best support in my husband, best friend and children. My other “ family”, my AA family, have let me take more than the 2min allotment when “sharing”at meetings. I’ve never once felt the need to pick up a drink. For me, that’s very important.

It’s time for me to pack my bag, and maybe have a little down time with Jimmy and the boys. Fred’s been babbling all day but I’m not going to let that stop me. Besides, Fred’s getting evicted and there’s no more rooms to rent inside my head.

Thanks for listening.