Treatments and New Treatments

Thank you to all of you who have kept me in your prayers, especially these past few weeks.  I decided to update you all via my blog to go into a little more details about what is going on and what the doctors are doing to help me out.

My last post mentioned about my recent fall and also about my doctors treatment plan.   He definitely thinks that when I fell, I inadvertently snapped by neck back, causing my already injured neck (from severe whiplash from the car wreck in 2016) to become even more inflamed.  The RadioFrequency Ablation procedure went well, although the recovery time usually takes about a week.   For those of you who don’t know what an RFA is, it is basically going into the nerves via needle-ultrasound and seeing which nerves are causing the pain and burning them; thus, “killing” the nerve, meaning no more pain.  It is all done under a great deal of sedation.  I actually wake up, not remembering much of anything.  The area where the doctor works does remain sore for about 7-10 days, as a lot of “post op” pain is.  The results of the RFA usually manifest itself within 2 weeks or so.   Things are better now and I’m no longer in post-op pain.  The RFA helps about 75% of the pain and that’s actually a lot compared to constantly being in pain and not being able to do much each day. 

Now, about my fall…… As most of you know, there was a time that I was having a falling spell, but these falls were just “trips” where I would land on my bottom, knees, or I would just catch myself before I would go down.  My UVA neurologist attributed it to my medications.  We couldn’t decrease my medication because my migraines were so intense that even what I was on, including Botox, was still give me 17+ days a month.  Eventually, I started to do better and I didn’t have falls for over a year and a half, until last month when I suddenly fell flat on my face and it was a HARD fall, with huge bruises everywhere.  I simply didn’t know what happened, or where it came from.  This put a red flag with my neurologist as he couldn’t figure out what was going on because he was almost* certain it wasn’t a seizure because of my current medication, but he couldn’t rule it out either.  He also threw out the possibility of more NF tumors possibly grown on my brain, which is something that we REALLY do NOT want to happen.  My last MRI was 5 yrs ago, and I usually get them between 5-7 years; I’m totally NOT an MRI fan.  He threw out the possibility of ordering a scan, but after talking it through, we decided to wait to see if another “episode” happens, and if it does, he will need to order the scan.   As far as my new migraine treatment, I finally got authorized to get AIMOVIG. It’s astronautically expensive for just one shot a month (I’m talking $$$ digits).  I got my first shot today.  It wasn’t really as bad as I thought it would be.  In fact I didn’t even feel needle when the pharmacist was showing me how to use the self-injector.  Please pray that this course of treatment works.  If it does, I can actually be weaned off on a lot of the oral medications, and perhaps my cognitive thinking and coordination (if it’s the meds) will return to normal.  Yes, I have to take it every month and it’s costly, but it’s better than feeling bad all the time. 

Thank you again for praying and reaching out to me!