look at my brain!

Nerd Alert: I have copies of basically all of my radiology scans (MRIs, MRAs, CTs) and had been trying, with no luck, for MONTHS to open these files on my computer. I finally got it to work last night (don't ask me how... I just started hitting buttons and then images appeared. Yay!) and literally spent a solid 3 hours just playing around with the pictures and being completely and totally fascinated by several things -- first, brains are f-ing awesome; second, that's MY brain on the screen... what?!; third, my brain is currently particularly kickass.

Honestly, I think I'm glad that I couldn't get the scans to open on my computer before the surgery... I knew that there had been some significant growth in my cyst, but I never saw that progression in side-by-side images, so I never really had much to compare it to, visually. Seeing it now is really damn cool -- to know something so freaking big was in my head and now it's not, but seeing it before the surgery would have probably let to spontaneous neurotic freak-out combustion. This whole situation is just so damn crazy.

Wanna see?! (Seriously, it's stupid how f-ing awesome I think these images are! If you're into nerdery as much as I am, you can click on the images to see them larger.)

March 9, 2011

I unfortunately don't have the same "splices" for the first images as I do for the rest of them, but you can still see what's going on in these -- the tumor itself is the small white part, and the dark area around the tumor is fluid (so, the cyst). This is the very first MRI I had, and at this point, the tumor was about 7mm and the cyst was about 13mm. This MRI was originally done to rule-out two things (ordered by my then-cardiologist) -- any stroke activity or an arteriovenous malformation (AVM), both of which would have been potentially related to the hole in my heart. Neither of those things showed up, but Trent did! Fucker.

May 11, 2011

These are some of the images from May, after an MRI from my first ever overnight hospital stay. The first picture is the same as the two above -- the tumor is white and the dark area around it is the cyst. In the image next to it, it's switched -- the tumor is dark and the white area is fluid. In these, the tumor is 7mm still, but the cyst is approximately 13mm across and 17mm down. This wasn't a significant enough change to be concerning at that point.

November 21, 2011

I had my 6 month MRI the morning of the 21st and then an appointment with my neurosurgeon about an hour afterwards. It was ridiculous how confident I was about this appointment -- I was so totally sure that there would be, again, no significant change in the tumor or cyst and I'd be told that all we needed to do was keep monitoring it. Instead, this happened!  I'm thinking I don't need to circle these for ya...? Yeah. Shit, son. NOT good! At this point, the tumor was about 8.5mm and the cyst was 25mm across and 30mm down and surgery was declared necessary and needed soon.

January 11, 2012

My scans the day before surgery -- the tumor was 8.5mm, and the cyst was 27mm across and 31mm down. Again, in this scan, the tumor is dark and the cyst/fluid is white... so you can see how massive the cyst is in comparison to the tumor!

And then, on January 12th, entered the best. neurosurgeon. ever. ......

January 13th, 2012

This right here would be a tumor- and cyst-free brain, friends! BAM! You can see a tiny little space where Trent and The Situation were, and there's some visible fluid build-up and swelling on the far right (where my head looks "bent"!). Still... oh hey, normal brain, what's good?!

January 25th, 2012

After everything went so smoothly with the surgery itself, my body decided to make sure I knew it was still fully in control. The below are CT images from the ER visit to check on Jefferson (the ever-growing bulge of cerebrospinal fluid that was leaking out of my perma skull-hole). See that gap at the bottom of both images? That would be where I used to have bone and now do not! Still so totally freaky. The plastic mesh covering isn't visible on the scan and though my neurosurgeon showed me the little titanium screws that were holding it in place, I wasn't able to find that same splice of image on my own! But they're there. It's real. Lastly... the very vague darker spot at the bottom of the left image and the more visible area of dark at the bottom of the right image? That would be all the spinal fluid that was taking up residence in the back of my head! So freaky and alien-like. But ya know what you don't see? A TUMOR.

So that's it, friends. You've now all seen my brain! Though I'm really in an odd place right now where I feel like I'm almost reconciling how totally wonderful and amazing all of this is (after six years of medical distrust and a general lack of progress with regard to a diagnosis, it's difficult to feel like this is essentially "over"... it's become an uncomfortable yet still very real part of my identity, so there's some adjustment there)... I've been full-on giddy since seeing and playing around with these images. It's just SO fucking cool to be so aware of the awfulness that your body can create (without your permission!), but then also how impressive your body can respond to intervention. Seeing the November and January scans and then looking at that day-after scan is so totally surreal and freaky, in a totally awesome way. 

Yay brains. :)