Hey all,
So 3 years ago, when I still live in Southwest VA, the left side of my face and fingertips on my left hand went partially numb on a Sunday afternoon. The next day nothing had changed, so I went to my local ER. After an initial MRI, followed by another one with contrast I was informed I had a very small lesion on the right pons of my midbrain (after a few days of laying in flux). They told me this was an incidental finding, and that there were no signs of bleeding and it was just a 'venous angioma'. I followed up with a neurosurgeon who said the same, and to just get on with my life as it was likely that nothing would ever happen. I've had plenty of weird little symptoms since, like stiffness in the muscles on my left side, tingling, tension headaches, and odd buzzy feelings in my head, but mostly I've been able to move past the anxiety and continue living. Since then I've moved to Brooklyn, and work in the city as a systems engineer for a tech startup. A few weeks back I was working onsite, at an office uptown and had to ride the elevator up and down from the 48th floor numerous times (mind you it's allergy season and I've had tons of pressure in my sinuses for weeks) and I found on each trip I was getting tons of pressure in my head, and the second day there I started getting a twitch in my left eye, and some pretty intense weird feelings in my head (I can only describe if for those of you that have indulged in marijuana, as that feeling when you sort of fade into being stoned.. only I wasn't using any drugs). I decided it was time I revisited the issue to make sure nothing had changed, and made an appointment with a neurologist at the NYU Langone Medical Center. After an initial screening she found I had a few issues that were alarming. I've had decreased sensitivity in touch, just ever so subtle ever since the episode I had 3 years ago, and my left knee is hyper reflexive. She said the twitching was from stress, and it's since gone away mostly. She ordered an MRI of the head and spine, and an MRA of the head to rule out MS (no contrast in either), and when she followed up with me she said she had good news, that the only thing that showed up was the one lesion, but to follow up with a neurosurgeon. A few days later I did just that, and he was Dr. Grim if there ever was one. He said he couldn't tell if it was just a DVA (which is what it says on the MRI report) or an AVM and wanted to do an angiogram, and how I'd be a good candidate for Gamma Knife most likely. Still he said it appears I've never had a bleed, and that it's very small. Does this make sense to anyone? I feel like a second opinion is in order prior to an angiogram, as he warned me of the risk of stroke, but if it is an AVM I definitely want to get it diagnosed and zap before a bleed happens. My anxiety is through the roof, messing up my personal life and work life, and I'm having all kinds of crazy feelings/symptoms and can't distinguish whats real and whats manifested by the anxiety. If it's not an AVM and just a DVA, I'll deal with the symptoms and let sleeping dogs lie. So I guess in summary, do I risk an angiogram, or try to find a doctor that can give me a better diagnosis via MRI/MRA?
-David