In early March, I was diagnosed with Cerebral Venous Thrombosis. That's a fancy doctor way of saying I had a blood clot on my brain. The day I got out of the hospital, I recorded this.
Then there was this update in April and this update in May. So much has happened since then, I figured it's time to put a bow on the CVT and re-brand this experience as clot-gate.
I got an MRI and the results were great. My Hematologist and Neurologist determined three things:
- the blood clot on my brain is gone - it was absorbed by my brain
- I have "brain damage", but nothing significant enough to treat or even worry about
- since the clot was gone, and I didn't test positive for any of the typical clot-causing disorders, I could stop taking blood thinners
We had no idea why I got CVT, but I was delighted to stop taking the blood thinners and jazzed to move on from it all. And for a couple of months, I did just that. The docs kept poking and prodding, but always came up empty. Then, about a month ago, I noticed my arm was rather tender and sore.
I had played catch the night before, and figured I had tweaked something in my arm. Maybe pulled a muscle or ligament or tendon or whatever is going on in my right arm, I didn't know, but I ignored the pain, which felt like a deep bruise, and figured it would go away on its own.
After ignoring this right arm pain for almost three weeks, I was walking to pick up my daughter's bike from the shop when I noticed a vein in my right arm was raised and that vein seemed to be the source of my arm pain. Since the CVT diagnosis in March, I'm on ultra high alert for vein pain, so I jumped on my bike and went straight to the ER. An ultrasound confirmed my suspicions. I had a blood clot in my arm.
So here's where we're at... I've had two blood clots in five months and we don't yet know why, so I was put back on blood thinners and I'm back with the Hematologist for further investigation.
My arm pain is gone, in fact, I have no pain anywhere. I feel fantastic, am biking up a storm (I hit 1000 km for the month of July on Saturday), I just take my blood thinners twice a day and keep my medical appointments so they can poke and prod until they figure this out.
At least my brain is fine....
