For as long as I can remember I have suffered from headaches, I have suffered so long that I began to just "deal" with them. Occasionally I would have so bad I would stay home from work or miss my daughters soccer games, but never have I had a headache that caused me so much pain I needed to visit the ER. That changed on August 13, 2016. I woke early that morning, 3 am with a headache that I knew was different, I knew it would leave me bed ridden on yet another weekend day. The difference with this headache is it hurt so bad that I was crying into my pillow as I squeezed my hands on my head trying to make it stop. My go to pain medication didn't begin to touch it and I knew this was a bad one.
I woke up got dressed and asked my father in law to drive me to the emergency room.
Upon arrival I got the typical cocktail of pain relief and fluids, was provided a CT scan and after no findings was sent home with some migraine medicine, pain meds and anti nausea medicine.
Sunday - didn't feel the greatest but manageable.
Monday - BEST I HAVE FELT IN YEARS no kidding, it is how I would expect to feel all the time. Tuesday - my ears were clogged and I simply thought here comes a cold, dammit.
Wednesday - I wake up and can't hear a thing out of my left ear not a single thing. Went to a baseball game with my coworkers and we all laughed how I couldn't hear anything out of my left ear and I even sat to the left of people so I could be part of the conversation.
Monday - BEST I HAVE FELT IN YEARS no kidding, it is how I would expect to feel all the time. Tuesday - my ears were clogged and I simply thought here comes a cold, dammit.
Wednesday - I wake up and can't hear a thing out of my left ear not a single thing. Went to a baseball game with my coworkers and we all laughed how I couldn't hear anything out of my left ear and I even sat to the left of people so I could be part of the conversation.
Because of my headache and the sudden ear loss I choose to not wait and get int to see my DR and opted for another ER visit.
WHAT A JOKE this place was...I walked in with the primary complaint of sudden hearing loss, I had explained I was just in another ER for a headache but that I didn't have one at the moment. SOOO they began treating me for a headache, I was so confused and partially thought well maybe they know what they are doing and went along for the ride. The told me that my hearing loss was a side effect of the migraine medicine that I was given (mind you I only took two of the pills since Sunday) but I wasn't buying into that. They gave me another CT Scan, this time with contrast only to come back with no findings. I again left with nothing other than an arm full of fluid due to the IV popping off inside my arm when the CT guy flushed my IV after the contrast.
Friday - I called my doctor who told me to come on in when I was able (he is pretty awesome like that). He agreed that something was wrong but my ears looked fine and he couldn't seem to figure out what was causing my headaches. He is familiar with my headache history and high pain tolerance so knowing I went to the ER he knew something just wasn't right, right then and there he called to make me an appointment with a neurologist. The cat and mouse game went on for about a week trying to connect with my doctor (he had some bad misfortunes happen that caused him to close his office temporarily) I knew he had already left a message with the neurologist so I called them myself and was able to get an appointment.
Friday August 26 - My neurologist, what a great experience. He spent over an hour with me evaluating me and asking me questions. He agrees I suffer from headaches but wasn't ready to admit my headaches and my hearing loss were related. He referred me to an ENT and ordered an MRI to cover his needs as well as the ENT, that was nice knowing I wouldn't need to get more than one done. I left the appointment feeling good and optimistic that I would get answers to my questions, his goal was to get me headache free and limit my medication intake for pain.
Friday August 26 - My neurologist, what a great experience. He spent over an hour with me evaluating me and asking me questions. He agrees I suffer from headaches but wasn't ready to admit my headaches and my hearing loss were related. He referred me to an ENT and ordered an MRI to cover his needs as well as the ENT, that was nice knowing I wouldn't need to get more than one done. I left the appointment feeling good and optimistic that I would get answers to my questions, his goal was to get me headache free and limit my medication intake for pain.
Wednesday August 31 - I went for my ENT appointment, again yet another positive experience. A hearing test confirmed I had hearing loss, the ENT knew I had an MRI scheduled and said based on my symptoms it would be one of two things 9/10 times it is an inner ear infection so he prescribed me steroids to treat an inner ear infection just in case, he then mentioned that the other thing was an acoustic neuroma. ~I had already researched acoustic neuroma's when my ears first started ringing back in March and was accompanied by sharp ear pain and facial twitching.~
I was convinced it would be an inner ear infection and went straight to fill my prescription.
Friday September 2 - I went into to get my MRI (finally it had been rescheduled twice) at 8am. At 11:30 I received a call from the ENT saying I was the 1/10 and my MRI confirmed I had a 1.5 cm x 1.5 cm x 1.5 cm tumor......I had already looked at the cd they sent home and knew there was something but I of course just didn't know what it was.
The neurologist had already called and got me on the schedule of the surgeon and now I wait until 9-19-2016.
So I headed off on my planned trip with my two daughters for a fun Labor Day and tried to put it in the back of my mind.
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