Over a year later, more than 3 years after the accident - I finally found new Doctors - ones who understood that I needed to heal more first from the accident before attempting such a risky brainstem operation with the latest mircroneurosugery tools. Even through I respected their knowledge and abilities I just knew that in order to have the best chance of survive from this very risky operation - I had to be at the health I had prior to the accident. And finally it was understood by a brilliant Integrated Neurologist who understood what had happened to me - both from the symptoms that I still have - and the history of symptoms since the accident - together with all the integrated medicine I had been doing to save my life daily. He understood how I had been coping with all of them through all the healing things I had done and continue to do to heal.

After examining me and talking it over - and reading all the documentation I put together of my supplements and treatments. We began to see that many of post cranial nerve injuries have a connection to the pons - that it is where the nerve root is for each one that showed symptoms after the accident - as well as the nuclei that control sleep and adrenaline.

MY NEW NEUROLOGIST HELPED MY DOCTOR TO UNDERSTAND MORE
WHAT SHE UNDERSTOOD BY WHAT MY PHYSICAL THERAPIST HAD FOUND

To her credit as well, my main Doctor at the time also put many things together with the help of my Physical Therapist who found inflammation at my left temple and at my tail bone - from a mild (because of all I was doing to fight it - through pH balancing and a cleansing diet) and systemic inflammation - that had to have a cause... and it was my MD who understood that it was most likely that old blood had caused it. This helped her to understood that there was another stroke at the car accident and my Neurologist agreed that that was likely by the multiple bleeds found at my last MRI that had showed it.

This stroke at the car accident was unlike the mild first one that healed so fast - because it was much worse due to the fact that the accident was complicated with many more injuries from the impact of the whiplash that included: cranial nerve injuries, TBI and with neck and back whiplash that prevented my yoga practice that had kept my health strong for 3 decades.

I did what stretching I could in the bath and even developed a bathyoga set. On my bad days I do up to 3 baths a day for pain relieve and to help calm my overloaded nervous system. I found the bath was the best place to do meditation that I could only do in the bath because it helped with the constant pain I now lived with that can be distracting to meditation.

Hypnotherapy has been a great help to have visualizations that help with a much needed calm through all the stress everyday since the accident - and having a life threatening condition is a very stressful thought - it affects all your plans when you live a headache/nausea lifestyle plus all the pain from whiplash+. But then I noticed my forgetfulness and being so easily emotional and stressed out.. I could not work as I used to - yet there had to be a reason.

The good news that my last 2 MRI's (1/08 & 7/08) - have both shown that the cavernoma is "stable" (no more bleeds). Yet the best news is that a skilled Neurosurgeon has found that - I am an exception - he says that the accident did cause another bleed due to the vulnerable cavernoma location causing the double vision I had (and possibly headaches) days after the accident. THANK GOD!

Now it is more clear that the other symptoms were due to the whiplash+ that was complicated by the re-bleed and the domino effect that it caused with my health due to all the symptoms together and old blood contamination.

However, there is still a concern in that the cavernoma is slowly growing bigger and that means that I may need an operation one day if it keeps getting bigger. I believe that there are non-surgical ways to do that and I am looking into that: Integrated Manual Therapies including CranioSacral Therapy, Lymph Drainage Therapy & Brain Nuclei Techniques.

The progress that has been made has much to do with me stopping my life to heal -and that's - once I found out that those with multiple in-head bleeds are often put on bedrest! So I began living a modified version of mostly staying at home and taking lots of baths and naps and each day I do that - I feel stronger - at some point I have a back slide day but over all I am healin- slowly but surely..

Up until I was told about the need for brainstem surgery... I was on a low ebb but still did my best to keep going as best I could to help out with family errands and caring for our son. Since I had stopped working to heal... and even had to move away with all the offers that came that I could not take... so I moved up to Northern CA and tried with old friends to start a Metephysical bookstore where I could work with clients in the back - as I felt I was up to it. (Or if I died all my things would be for sale - and these friends could sell it for my husband -to be less of a burden on him.) But with with the news of a need for surgery - a year last May - I let that go too so I could really focus on all the healing time I now understood I needed.

I am certain that without the car accident impact my cavernoma would not have bled again. I know this because I was focusing on a less stressful schedule after I lost my smile and preparing to to have the child we had put off till we were more settled. In our new home we focused on doing all I could to have optimal health just like we had done with our son- before he came when I was in my best shape ever at 36.

And the car accident stopped the baby plan in it's tracks - for now and maybe forever - short of a miracle. The accident caused so many other injuries in my back and neck I could not support the weight and if I had another bleed during labor that would be bad... plus I am 47 now past 45.

Did you know you need Doctor's permission to get pregnant after 45?

I was not sure if a Doctor would agree I could carry - when I finally did heal from all the whiplash+ - so I have made my peace and still pray for a miracle... but short of that. Our son will be an only child... he used to ask about it all the time. He doesn't anymore.

It was hard to know what symptoms were symptoms from the car accident impact and which were the whiplash+ and then the secondary injuries from what was not understood and on top of all that I was not able to do my yoga practice everyday - I am not able to do my set of Yogdadance Flow or Astanga - due to my tailbone pain and the stamina of the whole set is too much for me now - so I developed a form of healing I call bathyoga.

There were times I felt like I was dying and I don't think I would have made it if I had not been doing all the treatments and supplements I have been doings - ongoing - and the love of my husband and son at my side through it all. They have helped to inspire me to keep doing my best to heal from all this.

As far as HYDERGINE, there was a month when I could not get it and all my symptoms got worse. This was enough of a reason for me to make sure I always have some when I need it. It helps headaches immediately and other pains too - overall aches and stuff. I just feel better when I take it - it has many other positive side affects.. I feel like I am growing more intelligent and that is cool when you are dealing with TBI - who know's it just might heal it?

When the accident first happened - the first thing I did was study Hypnotherapy. I just knew that the Hypnotherapy would help me to communicate with my subconscious mind that controls my automatic nervous system. Somehow it was on overload and continues from the stress that continues to happen around the accident... it has been nothing but stress.

Like the kind of stress that comes from the fact that all the Neurosurgeons so far have completely different opinions of what to do and what happened at the accident to the cavernoma:

Neurosurgeon #1 - 2 years into the process - he says surgery is needed A.S.A.P. due to multiple bleeds that were found - prevention from it bleeding again. It was only a few months after the vulnerable small tear in the cavernoma had bled and healed - yet the Anginoma Alliance says that for 2 years after a first bleed a cavernoma is still vulnerable. Due to t the impact of the car accident more cranial nerves were injuried - along with this whiplash+ that seems to make me feel so weak I was dying at times ever since the car accident happened and he could not say what affect that the whiplash+ accident had had on the cavernoma when it was obvious that it had made my vulnerable condition worse and the whiplash + near impossible to heal - somehow due to combination of them both. He said it was possible but could not say for sure - that trauma was not known to cause brainstem cavernoma bleeds. They were very kind and seemed open to what I was doing as integrated healing methods.

Perhaps they are meant to learn this acception to the rule from my medical case? Perahaps due to where my cavernoma is located and the prior mild stroke that made what otherwise would not have bled - bleed with the whiplash impact?

With this possibility in mind I decided to heal more from the accident first... so I could prepare for surgery with better results because I would be in better overall health in time with lots of rest.

Also, I knew that I needed to find out more about this whiplash+ and my cavernoma's location and how they were possibly connected and why...to find out what helps it to heal.

However, once the need for brainstem micro- neurosurgery was known - my Doctors & practitioners at the time resigned for sake of liability because I had chosen not to do the opperation that a Neurosurgeon told me I needed to do.

I understand why they did that and althought it was hard at the time... I needed to find those who were not overwelmed by my condition and were curious as to what it would help it.

Neurosurgeon #2- 3 years into the process a freind talks to this Doctor about my case and he says that the location of cavernoma is inoperable. So doing the operation would have killed me for sure in his mind. He suggested for brainstem cavernomas - instead using the Gamma Knife that shoots radiation at the bleed. Interestingly enought, the first Neurosurgeon had said that they had stopped using the Gamma Knife because it caused additional bleeds and did not have good results overall for brainstem bleeds.

So I moved on and found new Doctors who not only agreed with my integrated approach - they thought is was a really good idea to prepare for a super risky brainstem opperation with cleaning out the infection and inflammation that was found by my Physical Therapist first.

IT WENT DOWNLIKE THIS:

Once my Physical Therapist found infection and inflammation at my tailbone and left temple as well as all kinds of pain along my dura... she began to see that I had been fighting for my life... from the bleed and the reprocussions of that bleed - with old blood contamination.

My new PMD said to me, "You had another bleed at the accident, another stroke."

She went on to say in a letter:
"She has several MRI's that well document this cavernous malformation and her history is totallyconsistaentwith aninital bleed in Nov 2004and a repeat bleed at the time of the MVA in April 2005."

Dr. Sidney Kurn said,
"It appears that following the MVA 4/5/05 the patient had significant sysmptoms including double-vision, nausea,some mental confulsion and difficulty with sterss. Given the anatomy of the cavernous malformation in the posterior pons it appear likely that the whiplash injury on 4/5/05 aggravated the cvanernous malformation and perhaps caused rebleeding. This would account for nausea and probably the diplopia. A rebleed at the time of the whiplash injury would also expalin Dr. Steinberg's observation that the mixed signal of the lesion suggested both old and new hemorrahages."

Neurosurgeon #3 - Now that I have devoted a year of my life to just healing to prepare for the operation - 3+ years into the process since the accident. And he says that it is operable but not needed. That is until I have double vision again. which would mean it was the cavernoma symptom that would tell me I needed the operation.

In his report this skilled Neurosurgeon has been very clear with this sentence.

"This woman has a cavernous malformation, I am not certain what symptoms may have been caused by this but the double vision that she had a few days following her car accident and perhaps headache then were cause of a small hemorrhage from the lesion."

HE REPORTED THIS INDEPENDENT OF READING THE OTHER DOCTOR REPORTS.

There are not many who have survived multiple in-head brainstem bleeds... I took the hydergine for the first stroke and had it in the house when the 2nd one happened as soon as I came home from the accident.

Hydergine is already being used for Strokes in European hospitals (also pre-surgery & First Aid in the ER) there ils a possibility that if I had not taken Hydergine 1/2 hour after the accient - I may have died.

However, it has been the cleaning up of the blood that bled then that has taken 3+ years. More so because in was an in-head injury that was not obvious due to my great health I was in at the time of the accidient. My yoga set would have cleared it out sooner - yet due to the whiplash I could not do my yoga practice.

I had a nose bleed that night - still unsure what that was- then a throat infection right after the accident that I have been dealing with ever since. (This is connected with the tonsil cyst that was found in the 3rd year after the accident.) On 4/8/05 I awoke with double vision that lasted a month 1/2. Also, I had a urinary infection in the second week after the accident (this is connected to the tail bone pain I am still dealing with.)

I did so many things to keep the infection & inflammation down.

Through what this expert in neurosurgry Evidence Based Research - once these Doctors treated me for what would have happened if there had been another bleed at the accident (old blood contamination causing infection and inflammation) and then I finally began to show some progress.

I started to use the KeratinFLX with amazihng results on my pain and it showed me how my symptoms connected from my LEFT temple headaches - LEFT Tonsil, TMJ (mostly LEFT), LEFT earaches, Thyroid, and abdomen pain all the way to my tailbone. So it proved how they were all connected and getting some kind of nurtients and help from the keratin filled tonsil cyst with calcium deposits.

CranioSacral Therapy showed me how all my symtoms are connected. It was the only things that made the choking sensation in my throat go away. Every symptom I had was part of the 10-steps of the Upledger technique. It taught me much more about how and what I could do about it. Knowing both those things has shown me that surgery may not be needed at this time and yet my integrated approach knows that I need to continue to monitor with MRI's just incase it is needed. I know how the symptoms tell me I am stable and if it is getting worse... any or all of it I do something about it.

HOWEVER..... I have found often enough that when it gets worse - that this is a 'healing crisis'.