My Ruptured Brain Aneurysm Experience: From A Spouse’s Point of View Part 2
2/4 Emails that my husband sent to me while I was in the hospital for a ruptured brain aneursym.
It’s Black Friday and I’m next to you. Sorry if there are typos but I’m writing this with one hand while massaging you with the other.
Picking up from where I left off at around 8am at home on Wednesday, after I helped get the kids settled and stuff the ambulance driver told me that I should be able to see you soon so I started to head over. I didn’t really know what to think still, everything felt very surreal. When I was walking in the hospital the doctor called me and asked me to rush in so I did. When I got there, the doctor basically told me again that you had a ruptured aneurysm and that they did another cat scan on you when you arrived and your swelling got much worse than it was in Fremont. I fucking lost it at that point and was crying uncontrollably. He told me that I needed to give consent to relieve the pressure in your brain and said it wasn’t really an option but really a formality. He said after that was done they would need to do a cat scan to make sure things were better and then they would have to do surgery to address the aneurysm. They thought I was going to faint because of how I was crying. One of the nurses gave me your wedding band because of likely swelling and that really didn’t help my crying. I asked if I could touch you or speak to you before that and they said I could. I held your hand and told you that I love you and I felt your hand jerk and saw a tear come out of your eye, that also didn’t help me with my crying. I could feel you there even though you were super sedated I know you could hear me and I felt that you were scared, or maybe I was just so scared it was enough for the both of us… they told me I had to wait in the waiting room so I did. The waiting room during these times are creepy because of the no visitor policy so I was there, alone, with my thoughts. I think it was around then that I needed to tell people what was going on but I didn’t want to clearly blast the whole world so I only told Jasmine in regards to your friends and told her to use her discretion on who and how she wanted to tell people. Oh I forgot two things, I think on my way to Redwood City my brother called me back and I explained what happened, he and Dona were freaking out. Also I believe at Fremont I told your brother that he needs to figure out everything about the Paso Robles trip and what they are going to do.
So I waited in the waiting room and the surgeon called and found me and explained the potential process of what was going to happen. He gave me 3 scenarios based off of what he saw on the previous cat scan. One is that they would kind of close off the section where you had the aneurysm and basically the brain would be compensated by another section. He said he might not be able to do that though because there is a line that looked close to your aneurysm and he didn’t want to affect that. The more ideal situation is that he wanted to put a stent in where your aneurysm is and that would essentially route the blood away from the aneurysm and the aneurysm would kinda close off or decrease. He said that method is his preferred choice and is a newer method that they use for people with aneurysms before they rupture but he is hoping he will be able to do that. I cried quite a bit more while he was explaining that just out of fear. I attached the drawings that he drew for me below.
At this point the doctor who performed the pressure relief came out to the waiting area and told me the procedure was done and it was a success (thank God). So at that point they were going to take you to surgery and that was going to take like 3 to 4 hours. At this time it was around 1230pm so I decided to go home and put Lily down for a nap since waiting in my own thoughts after hysterically crying probably wasn’t a good idea.
Oh I forgot to mention that in the morning when I went home I took the kids car seat out of my car just in case your family needed to take them somewhere. Your family also said that they planned on just doing thanksgiving on their own but hoped to get the larger family together on Friday and asked if they could do it at our house which I said fine. Anyways I was on my way back to the hospital to get there around 230.
At the hospital I was just waiting in the car since I was waiting for the doctor to call me to tell me you were done with surgery so I was just trying to get everything in order. I told my boss what happened and that I would update her on how it affects work before the end of the weekend. I looked at your LinkedIn to connect with your bosses so I could tell them what was going on. My brother told my mom what was going on and she called me while I was waiting. She was crying a lot. She loves you a lot and was obviously concerned about the family as a whole. My brother asked if he could come by but I told him not to bother because he can’t even be in the building but he decided to anyways because he knew I was just waiting in the parking lot. I fell asleep in the car for a bit waiting to hear from the doctor, it was actually my moms call that woke me up. While I was waiting in the parking lot I got a call from the surgeon and he told me that it went great and they were able to do the stent method I mentioned earlier (thank God again). I cried so much after hearing that. The doctor said there is still a risk for a few things but most noticeable is a risk for stroke in the next four days as things adjust in your head. They said you were going to need a bit before I could come up and at that time my brother arrived. We talked, he saw me cry a lot. We talked about the plan a bit and keep in mind my brother and Dona were trying to take the kids all day and I came to the conclusion that it was best for my brother to take them. So the plan was that my brother takes the kids for the time being and that I would stay there too starting tomorrow. I guess your family was intending to come over every day so the kids could sleep at home which is nice. My brother left and I made my way up to see you.
Sorry I forgot to mention that between the pressure relief and surgery I did get to see you again. This was the point where I saw you with your hair partially shaved and to be honest I expected it to look worse. I guess even with you missing hair it isn’t a big deal to me. I know you are not going to be happy about it but it will grow back, no big deal. Anyways, I cried a ton when I saw you then too because of the risk of you having a stroke during the surgery which they told me was at like 30% (but didn’t happen).
Anyways, I came up to see you and yep I was crying again. You were super sedated but could respond a little physically. The doctors told me that they were going to keep you sedated until the next day because of the pain and you were still on life support. You had movements of trying to pull out your breathing tube which was a good sign. They said they were likely going to pull out the breathing tube tomorrow if you could breathe well on your own which was likely and stop the sedation. Since that was the case I figured the most meaningful thing I could do is go home and take care of the kids. It honestly fucking killed me to leave you even though I wasn’t doing anything for you. It’s weird now though, juggling being a husband and a father… I feel stretched thin trying to balance between the two at this time.
On the way home I pretty much told everyone that I tried to call the night before to be on standby the next few nights in the case that I had to run out of the house. I also told your family that I would take the kids to my brother’s tomorrow morning then head back over to you so your family doesn’t have to worry about them and also because it would be better for the kids in regards to playing with people their own age and not being stuck in front of a screen all day like I saw wherever I went back home. They were ok with that plan. Your parents had gone back home already earlier in the day so it was your brother, sister, and David with the kids at the house.
*end of Black Friday visit, I just left the hospital and am so happy with your progress. You are so strong. It’s sad that after two days I haven’t even finished writing about Day 1 but it’s close. The next two days should be shorter and probably more full of personal thoughts but I still have catching up to do. I love you with all my heart. You and our kids are my entire world. Good night.*
