Angio today. This time I wasn’t dizzy and nauseous and having a stroke, so I was able to look around and appreciate the neurovascular radiology department at St. Luke’s. Dr. Mawad, who performed my first angio, wasn’t there this time. I tried not to feel disappointed; I wanted to walk up to him and say, “Hey, remember me? I’m okay, now!” Friday his staff told me he would be out of town this week. Dr. Morsi took the photos, instead. He knew who I am, but I wasn’t awake when we first met. He took 3-D angiographs of my AVM in the OR with Dr. Chen.

I felt a prick in my left groin and felt the catheter slide its way inside. I had a hundred questions to ask about the procedure and the pictures on the six LCD screens to my left. The screens weren’t facing me, but out of the corner of my eye I could see six different views of the vasculatre of my brain. The procedure room was quiet. Nobody held my hand, talked me through the procedure, or even made small talk about the weekend or the weather. Behind his glasses I could see Dr. Morsi concentrating as the x-ray machines spun around my head. I was concentrating, too, trying very hard to hold still and not cough like I had during much of the previous night. In a room full of people I felt lonely, but I bit my tongue and said nothing, lying still so the images would be clear.

The angio was more involved and intense this time around. Instead of being sedated and holding my breath for one bolus of contrast, I remained alert during the entire procedure and cooperated (by taking a big breath and holding it) for several rounds of contrast. The catheter traveled up my left femoral artery. The right artery is customary, but maybe Dr. Morsi chose the left maybe because he wanted to be fair. Actually, I think he really wanted to minimize complications with scarring. When the doctor injected the contrast, for some reason only the left side of my head really hurt; last time my whole head hurt. The hurt was something like a brain freeze, but over a much larger area, and the sensation was more of a heat burning (think sinking into a too-hot tub, too quickly). I’m not sure if I described any of this well, but maybe you get the idea. The worst part of the injection wasn’t the headaches, though, but the white-hot streaks of light speeding left to right every time I received a bolus of contrast. It was like suddenly watching a group of shooting stars streaking right before my eyes.

Then I felt the catheter run back out, and a little gush of hot, hot blood splash over my thigh. In a few minutes I found myself back into the holding area, with Matt holding my bag of books and his laptop.

My head still hurts. A collagen plug was used to close the femoral artery; I don’t know what Dr. Mawad did during my first angio; I’m assuming he sutured the incision shut. I found the concept of a collagen plug a little amusing, but also a little disconcerting. I imagine a cork in my femoral artery.

After the angio I lay around for a few hours, resting and reading and talking to Matt about our house and how we are going to fix it. Because it’s a house of architectural note, we just can’t paint it pink or anything, and constantly worrying about protecting its architectural integrity makes the whole repair process even more difficult than it already is . . . we’re trying to do everything we need to do before Vivian moves on, before the sun gets too hot for anyone to want to work, before the summer thunderstorms start. Some relaxing recovery this has been; I’ve lately spent it all on trying to figure out ways how to fix the house and not blow our budget more than we already have.

I guess I should note what the results of the angio were. It’s hard to say much, because I don’t really know. Apparently there is a bit of the AVM still left. That’s all I know. I guess that’s why Dr. Morsi was running so much contrast through my head; he wanted to get a really, really good image in order to figure out how much we should worry. In a couple of weeks I’ll visit with Dr. Chen, and hopefully they’ll have figured out by then what we do next, if anything.