February 24, 2012

A Scary Story

When you've been married a year and your hubby is only 23 years old, you never think that you will be sitting in the hospital after he has a mini stroke. BUT that's exactly what happened in our neck of the woods on Wednesday. 
I had been at work a half hour when I got a call from Dan saying that he was on his way to the hospital and I needed to meet him there. Apparently, what had happened was that Dan had gone to work at 9am and around 10:45am he started to get a migraine. This was nothing unusual because he has these all the time but a few things started to happen this time that weren't normal. He lost his vision for a few minutes and then it was just blurry. Then he started to have the whole left side of his body go numb and weak. So he took some aspirin and had Jeremy (his brother) drive him to the hospital from work. 
At the ER they ran a few tests which confirmed to them that he had had a TIA (Transient Ischemic Attack) or mini stroke and they were going to admit him to the hospital to do further testing and observe him for 24 hours. After we got to his room, my dad and Bryan came in and gave Dan a blessing which eased our stressed and nervous minds a bit. (I'm so grateful to have worthy men in my life who are able to do this for my husband!) And then shortly after that, Dan went in for an MRI, an MRA, and an echocardiogram. 
When he got back we just waited. Dan had TONS of visitors (we are so loved!!) and then it was just us for the night. Dr. Allen came in around 8pm to speak with us a bit about what they had found out. We learned from him that Dan had a PFO (Patent Foramen Ovale) or a hole in his heart. We suspected this because Dan's mom and his uncle, Travis, both had that exact same thing and had to get it closed up. We just weren't really sure what would happen from there and what the effects were. The doctor gave us good info on what it was BUT he didn't really seem like he knew much else. He told us that it wasn't genetic, so he didn't think it really mattered that his mom and uncle had it and he also told us that the migraines had nothing to do with why he had this. 
Around 11pm, the cardiologist, Dr. Menchenda, came in to discuss the PFO with us and we loved him! He was so personable and he explained things in a way that would help us better know what to do. He also gave us some really good informational articles on getting PFO's closed up that he thought would help us. We trusted his words a lot more than the first doctor because this is his special area and he told us pretty much the opposite of what Dr. Allen said; it IS genetic and migraines DO play a part in it. 
Once he left we talked about things a bit and started reading the articles but then we slept (kind of). I stayed up until I read every article Dr. Menchenda gave us and I felt a lot better about my knowledge on what Dan had. Sleeping on that tiny couch was the worst! I think I only got about 3 hours of sleep and Dan probably did too cause the nurses had to keep coming in to check on him every few hours. Needless to say it was a long night! 
The next morning they drew more blood from Dan for more tests (mostly to check to see if his blood is hypercoagulable, or prone to clotting easily) to see if it would be better for Dan to just go on blood thinners or if he needs to have it closed. We got to go home around 11am with a prescription for Dan to take a baby aspirin and a Plavix (another blood thinner) once a day and to check back in next week for the results of all the testing. I was so glad to be home yesterday, finally, but we were both so tired and stressed. Which is why I finally had a breakdown from it all. One day everything's fine and the next...ugh. It's all just so new and scary and now it's kind of a waiting game. 
So the rest of the afternoon yesterday, Dan and I just relaxed. Amber, Kayla, and Dan brought us dinner which helped alleviate some of the stress (we're so lucky to have such good friends!) and as soon as we finished eating both of us were out and we didn't really wake up, other than for a few hours, until this morning. Today Dan went to work but he's still got a headache and he's been pretty dizzy still but the hospital said they think it's from all the blood he had taken so we get to stock him up on the iron tonight! I'll give an update after next week! For now, I'm just glad to have my husband home and doing ok. I love him so much.

2 comments:

Kristen said...

Oh my goodness! That is scary! I'm so glad that he is ok. I hope that you guys are able to continue to get some answers. We'll be thinking of you!

Kelcie said...

Oh gosh! I'm so sorry you had to go through that! Glad you have such a great support system. You guys are in mine and Dave's prayers!