Benign Intracranial Hypertension

Benign Intracranial Hypertension/Pseudotumor Cerebri
or My Brain Wants to Explode


"Your brain wants to explode?!" you, the horrified reader, are probably asking yourself right now.

Well...maybe not literally, but it sure feels like it. See, Intracranial Hypertension (from here on out referred to as IH) is a rare condition where the cerebro-spinal fluid in the brain does not drain, or does not drain properly. The fluid builds, putting more and more pressure on the brain and creating symptoms including migranes and lesser headaches, vision problems including blindness, dizzyness, nausea, and buzzing in the ears (in other words, all the symptoms of a brain tumor without actually having a brain tumor). My subtitle comes from one of two ways I tend to feel. Imagine you are blowing up a balloon. Now, if you put too much air into it, it will explode. My head often feels like that balloon moments before it pops. At other times, it feels like a bodybuilder is putting a railroad spike through my skull with a sledgehammer. Perhaps the worst part is that pain killers, such as asprin, don't work because the headaches are the result of direct pressure on the brain.

As I mentioned earlier, IH is a rare disease. One website I visited estimates only 12,000 people in America suffer from it. However, or perhaps thus, most doctors have never even heard of IH; those who have seem to be restricted to the ophthimology and neurology fields. Emergency-room physicians, general practitioners, and others are more than happy to diagnose IH as bladder infections, sinus infections, ear infections, but most often, stress-related nothingness. And, as the average IH sufferer is an overweight female of childbearing years, many people who do not fall into that category are not diagnosed - at least not immediately. I was fortunate enough to have an eye doctor poke at me for almost an hour, then declare I needed to see a neurologist. And I was even more fortunate to find a very competent ophthomologic neurologist.

Still, though IH is treatable, it is not, generally, curable. As I have been newly diagnosed, I don't know what this will mean for me. I have read others' stories, though, and have a general idea. It means having to go in for spinal taps every now and again, and getting shunts inserted into the spine to help drain excess fluids. It means suffering from headaches and dizzyness. It means I will need people to be wheels for me if I have to go somewhere, because I certainly can't drive myself. It means infertility (although, as I don't want children, I don't see this as a particular drawback). It means daily medications exceeding 1000 mg in dosages, sore eyes, sleepless nights, and a near-sense of disorientation.

If you, dearest reader, have gotten this far, you are now wondering why I have chosen to tell you all of this. I am telling you because it needs exposure. If more people know about this disease (and by more people I specifically mean medical professionals), there is a better chance it will be researched and cures developed. But even more important is that someone might have their eyesight saved or months of not-really-stress-related migranes going undiagnosed because some doctor doesn't think or know to check for IH.