Where the Road May Lead by Sharon Greenwell

Author:Sharon Greenwell [Greenwell, Sharon]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781665508360
Publisher: AuthorHouse
Published: 2020-11-24T05:00:00+00:00

7

The Diagnosis

and Surgeries

It seemed that one month after my MRI, the radiologist reviewed my films and discovered the Arnold Chiari Malformation and Syringomyelia, and scoliosis. The next step was to a neurosurgeon. These were extremely rare conditions at that time, and it was long before home computers were affordable, so we were at the mercy of these doctors.

Up to this point, I was quite healthy. I had been accused of being too mean to get sick and too dumb to know when I was sick. With the issues I already had, I had to learn to overcome all of that so being a wimp wasn’t an option for me.

It was May of 1991. Roughly 40 years have passed, and never had an explanation for my issues.

The day came for my meeting with the neurosurgeon. Seems I had two very serious birth defects and if I didn’t get these conditions taken care of immediately, within a few months, I would be in a wheelchair. All of the issues I had were caused from these conditions. I was in total shock.

Unsure I was hearing everything correctly, I made a second appointment, and had Daniel with me. Again, all of this was gone over, along with the urgency to act quickly. After talking with some family and friends, we decided to go for a second opinion.

That turned out to be a waste of time. All he said was “if you put two cooks in a kitchen with the needed ingredients and tell them to bake an apple pie, you will get two apple pies”. This was supposed to ease my mind? All that accomplished was my definitely not wanting him doing my brain surgery.

I was back to the original neurosurgeon, and surgery was scheduled which gave us 6 long weeks of worrying, and getting things ready for my recovery.

Most of my family was there for the surgery, and afterwards my mom stayed with us to help out while I was recovering. The first surgery went well, or so we were told. Within a few days I was released from the hospital. A few days later, fluid began squirting out the incision site. There was so much pressure behind it, it would shoot 6 – 8 feet across the room. We contacted the doctor and went straight to his office. On the way to his office, I got terribly sick. Mom pulled off to the side of the road, and as I was hanging out the door vomiting, Mom was holding a towel to the back of my head to catch the spinal fluid. He just added a couple more staples, and sent me home. A couple days later, the fluid was squirting out the incision again.

This time I was admitted to the hospital for six days for a temporary shunt to drain the excess fluid. Sent home, and within a few more days, I was back in the hospital, but this time for a permanent shunt. The incision finally healed, but apparently the shunt wasn’t working.

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