I was diagnosed with intracranial hypertension (pseudotumor cerebri) last year after months of undiagnosed symptoms and almost going blind due to papilledema. The MRI showed a blood clot, I believe in the back of my brain, though I'm not certain of the position. My neurologist isn't good at explaining things. My diagnostic opening pressure for the lumbar puncture overflowed the gauge, so it was over 50.
I then had a lumboperitoneal shunt put in and was told to take a baby aspirin a day. The pressure was okay for a while with only an occasional headache...but as with before the surgery, the back of my head often constantly ached. Then I went through a few weeks in pain, three or four days in particular where my headache was horrible and the back of my head and my neck ached like crazy. My scalp felt kind of...tingly? Burning? But then it went away and went back to only an intermittent headache. I recently had my shunt valve adjusted (perhaps overadjusted) because the pressure was in the low 20's.
Even without high pressure, I have that nagging aching and occasional burning in the back of my head. Last week at my neurologist, I told the doctor I would like another MRI to check on the clot, and she said it wasn't necessary. I asked her if the aspirin would dissolve the clot and she said no that it would stop new clots from forming and the one I have from enlarging. She apparently intends to leave it there. When I told her about the aching back of my head, she told me that you never feel blood clots in your head.
So my questions are:
1) Can you really never feel clots in the brain? They couldn't be pressing on something and causing aching or burning or something?
2) Why would I have a few horrible days and then go back to feeling mostly okay? It's not like I did anything different in my daily life. Could it have been the clot bleeding a little bit or something, and then it stopped?
3) Last year my neurologist/surgeon questioned the neurologist on duty at the MRI's judgment about my MRI. She saw nothing wrong with it, but he was confident it was abnormal. She mentioned that that part of the brain is usually apparently vague or something, though she admitted to not be an expert at reading MRI's. Given the apparent vagueness and nature of the matter, could what was called a blood clot not actually be one? Could it be something else?
4) My grandmother on my father's side had to have brain surgery in her later years because of "tangled arteries" in her brain. I don't know the medical name for it and can't find out, but could such a condition possibly be hereditary/increase someone's chances for it?
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