Magnetic Resonance Imaging

Nobody has an MRI Scan for the hell of it.

So it is fair to say that the whole experience is not particularly pleasant. There are a number of reasons for this: you have to at least suspect that there is something wrong with you and the procedure is not the most comfortable thing you will ever do.

In my case I was having one because it was almost certain that I had had a Stroke. The medics were almost certain but wanted the final confirmation that only an MRI Scan could bring.

The whole concept of the MRI Scan got off to a poor start with me when it looked as if even the wait for one would mean a longer stay. I had come into hospital on the Thursday evening and by the early hours of Friday morning I had been admitted. It was clear, very early on, that I was not going home again until the Consultant had seen the results of the MRI, the CT scan I had had before admission not being enough. Of course this requirement came with the expectation that the next available slot would be sometime on the Monday.

On Friday, having almost prepared myself for a weekend sampling the delights of a diner, bed and breakfast stay curtesy of the NHS, I was somewhat taken aback to be informed just as afternoon visiting began that I could have my scan but it needed to be now. Having changed into the “Hospital Gown” I was given and put on my shoes and socks I waited. Within moments an orderly appeared who, after advising that I put a jacket on if I had one, told me he was to escort me to the scanner. Not knowing how long it would take, or even where it was in the hospital, I assumed it would be similar to the CT Scan, a few minutes so I told my partner that I would be OK and that she should wait for me. How wrong I was.

The MRI Scanner was not just in another part of the building but elsewhere on the site, it took ten minutes to walk there, where I was left in the hands of two technicians who where at least expecting me. After the shortest of waits, during which I filled in some minor paperwork, I was led into the scanner room. Once I had been asked to take off my shoes, but leave my socks on, and jacket I was told lie on my back on the gurney with my head toward the machine. After placing a tube in my hand, for emergencies, and plugs in my ears both technicians disappeared into the control room but not before warning me to lie very still and advising me that it would only take a couple of minutes. Following a slight jolt I began to enter the tube that is the MRI Scanner.

I don’t generally suffer from claustrophobia but the closeness of the walls, the antiseptic whiteness of the tube and the deep mechanical sound made me feel uneasy.

Suddenly I was returning to the much more comforting surroundings of the scanner room. Believing that it was done I began to sit up but was told to lie back down by the approaching technician who went on to explain that she needed to fit an apparatus to my head that would keep it absolutely still. The contraption that she set about constructing about my head felt like a close fitting Meccano helmet, only made of plastic: metal and the magnetism of the scanner not being compatible. The building of this device seemed to take forever and apparently required much delicate placement and replacement of large amounts of foam padding. Eventually the technician seemed satisfied and retreated back to the control room. Again I entered to tube but this time I took a feeling of being trapped in with me. To my relief, seconds later I was making the reverse journey, only for the technician to play some more with her feat of engineering, before ensuring that I still had the bleeper in my hand and leaving again. I was encased in the tube for a third time. This time the disembodied voice of one of the technicians filled my ears as she told me that I had to stay completely and totally still and that it would only be a few more minutes. Oh, and that I should try to relax. Easy for her to say!

The noise came back and all I could do was try to follow instructions. I was not sure if I was allowed to move my eyes so I looked straight ahead but that made everything feel even closer so I closed them which had the effect of making time elastic.

After what felt like hours but was in actual fact only a few minutes the noise faded and I began to slid out of the tube. This time both technicians appeared either side of my head and were deconstructing the plastic helmet. And they were smiling!

I was told to go the waiting area while they checked the results. So replacing my shoes and jacket, to cover the gap at the back of the gown that is exactly what I did. Before long one of the technicians reappeared to confirm that the results were fine and that I could go back to the ward. As I got up to leave she said that I was to wait until someone came to escort me back. So I waited. And waited. And waited. And waited.

Eventually another orderly arriveded to accompany me up to the ward, where I arrived just as the two hours of visiting time came to an end and my partner had to leave!

Then began the wait for the results. 

Attack

In the early hours of the 25 of January 2015 some wee beastie, as Scots friends would say, stole into the bedroom and after removing the top of my skull used a baseball bat to give my brain a bit of a thump. Then this wee little monster seamlessly rejoined the two parts of my skull and silently bidding me goodnight disappeared into the darkness from whence it came.

In other words: I had a STROKE.

As the medics would say I had an acute medial inferior pontine perforator infarct on the left with signs of chronic microangiopathic changes and lacunar infarcts.

In plain English, I had a clot in a blood vessel which starved an area of my brain of oxygenated blood.

It all happened, as I said at the beginning, over the night of 24/25 January.

We had been to a Burns’ Night Supper in the Village Hall on the 24th.

Kate and I had been following a “dry January” (probably will not be doing that again) as we had done many times before. We did, however, generally give ourselves a dispensation for the Burns’ Night Supper, you have to really. The supper was the usual affair with Haggis, Neeps and Tatties, music and dancing. For the last few years it has been organised by a couple in the village, who do a great job.

The evening commenced with a few words of welcome from the chairman followed by the Selkirk Grace.

The Haggis, carried by the chairman’s partner, was Pipped in to an accompaniment of slow hand clapping.

Once the Haggis was in place at the top table a rendition of  Burns’ “Address to a Haggis” followed, though thankfully not all eight verses, at the end of which the Haggis was cut open and taken away to be served.

The meal consisted of 

Cock-a-leekie Soup

Haggis with Neeps and Tatties

Sherry Trifle

Coffee

And Whiskey

The speeches were interesting.

The chairman gave the speech to the Immortal Memory of Rabbie Burns including extracts of his poetry which, if a little long, was very entertaining. 

The Toast To The Lasses, given by a local farmer was, to put it mildly, intriguing. It was dripping with sexist comments and was welcomed with a ripple of stunned applause and I probably wouldn’t have wanted to be in his house of all girls over the next day or so.

The Response, given by Kate although written by myself, went down well by comparison and received the plaudits it deserved.

The evening was rounded off by traditional Scots Dancing.

Being a village and Burns’ Night Supper being almost the sole preserve of the older section of its population the evening drew to a close at around midnight.

I had not had very much to drink, a couple of glasses of wine and a tot or two of Whiskey at the supper and a further tot or two when we got home but probably a lot after nearly a month off. We went to bed at around half past midnight. I simply could not settle and tossed and turned. Worrying that I would wake Kate I decided to move to the step-daughter’s room, she being away in the Alps doing a Ski Season. Things were no better in the new room but I think I did eventually drift off to sleep. When I woke on the Sunday morning I certainly felt under the weather but put it down to the minor excesses of the evening before. The Sunday was quiet, with a little writing but not much else.

During Sunday I did become aware of a number of what I now know as deficiencies. My right hand felt a little numb and vaguely leaden. My right arm felt heavier than usual, almost as if it was carrying a couple of extra pounds. My right foot was a slightly stiff and at times the ankle dragged a little, with the leg feeling as if there was a weight strapped to it. When I was tired my speech had a touch of slur to it. And then there were the headaches.

On the Monday my Kate headed off for what was a long week away, to return on the Thursday, while I continued to deliver a large number of parcels. For the past two and a half years I had been working six days a week delivering up to ninety packages and travelling between thirty and one hundred miles a day and that was to continue during that week with me finishing well after seven most days and sometimes as late as nine.

The deficiencies got no better as the week went on. I also found that I was getting more and more tired, not helped by the fact that I was on the receiving end of an almost total lack of sleep.

On Thursday evening I was making my way home at around seven o’clock and as I came through the village next to ours I was caught by a speed camera van. I had slowed down and really was convinced that I was travelling at 30 miles an hour but apparently not.

Arriving home a little flustered and somewhat annoyed I was met by Kate who had been home for about half an hour. After listening to me rant on about speed cameras for a few minuets she asked if I was OK. When my answer was slightly slurred she said that she thought so. After telling me that I was obviously no better she suggesting that I go and have a shower. 

Kate was waiting for me when I finished my shower with the news that she thought that I had had a STROKE.