I think I know how I am going to die.
…and it has given me comfort.
(There are some 80s references in here so buckle up.)
I recently experienced a thunderclap headache. It started in the back of my head, near the base of my skull, then exploded over the top of my head. The pain was immediate. There was no build up like some headaches that start small and grow over time. There wasn’t a location, it was everywhere. All at once. It felt like my head was going to explode a la Scanners circa 1981.
IYKYK.
I was at work; it was after lunch. Just doing my thing when it started, pulling my head back. The name “thunderclap” is appropriate. Imagine a thunderclap right over you. It shakes the house and rattles the windows and gives a jolt to everyone right underneath it. The intensity and onset of this headache was exactly the same.
My co-worker didn’t know how to help. I was just holding my head and saying “the pain” over and over again. Maybe under different circumstances I would have giggled seeing as how I sounded a bit like Tattoo from Fantasy Island. He wanted to call an ambulance and I said, “I can’t afford an ambulance.”
Cold compresses and standing in front of the window AC unit didn’t help. I laid down on the concrete floor, head on a pile of rags… I work in a maintenance garage for a large nursery in my hometown… His phone rang. A work call.
I motioned for my phone and while I laid on the floor with a pile of rags as a pillow, I consulted Dr. Google.
Entering “sudden onset headache back of the head,” the first listing was from the Mayo Clinic. It read “Thunderclap headaches live up to their names, striking suddenly like a clap of thunder. The pain of these severe headaches peaks within 60 seconds. Thunderclap headaches are uncommon, but they can warn of potentially life-threatening conditions — usually having to do with bleeding in and around the brain. Seek emergency medical attention for a thunderclap headache.”
That was all I needed to read to ask him to take me to the hospital. On the way, I’m wondering, “Does this hospital take my insurance? Are they in-network?”
I did call my son and tell him to tell his dad, and to make arrangements to get his sister off the school bus. I’m sure he was freaked out, but I wasn’t going to leave my daughter stranded, even if my head was exploding.
Once in the Emergency Room, which was packed, the intake nurse asked me about my symptoms and no sooner did I say, “It started back here and then exploded across my head…” and the fact that I was dripping with sweat and couldn’t sit still.
I was taken back immediately much to the dismay of the 40 people sitting in the waiting room. Vitals were taken. My heart rate and blood pressure were really high. I was in at Cat scan machine in 20 minutes. One pass without contrast, one with.
After that I was told I was getting a room. Out of triage and into a room. It was there that I was told that there was no active bleeding in my brain which was excellent news. The doctors did not have a reason for my headache, there was nothing obvious to indicate what set it off.
What they did find was an aneurysm.
Just a little one. Only 3mm.
The doctor assured me that there was nothing to worry about today. I was in no immediate danger. Regardless, the words “brain aneurysm” are not comforting at all.
She told me to make an appointment with a neurologist who would review the scans and decide on a course of action, which she felt would be yearly observation. Her calm demeanor and soothing voice, even if she looked fresh out of high school, assured me that I wasn’t going to pop any time soon.
I went home four hours after entering the hospital. The meds they gave me made me twitchy and restless and yet exhausted at the same time. I got home, hugged my children and my dog. The cats piled on, knowing I needed their healing purrs. I was too restless for them and they gave up. I slept for 12 hours.
By the next morning, I was too restless and unsteady to drive so I stayed home from work. I spent most of the day bopping around like a toddler but by dinner, the restlessness was gone.
The women in my family live to ripe old ages and then they wink out, usually due to a stroke. I’ve always felt that this was going to be me as well, despite my father’s genetics hitting me with some tendencies towards diabetes.
Maybe I won’t stroke out at 95. Maybe my head will just explode internally and that will be that. It seems apropos.
No one wants to talk about their mortality or the mortality of their loved ones but after the death of my father, I think it is an exceptionally important topic to discuss. We’re all gonna die someday. Get your affairs in order, revisit them yearly. We don’t always know when or how but it is going to happen.
Well, maybe now I know how.
