Essay: Catonsville Teen Reflects on Health Problems

[Editor's note: Ashley Witzke sent her essay to Patch, which we posted for her. To post your own announcement, go to http://catonsville.patch.com/search/announcements and click on 'add an announcement.]

My name is Ashley Witzke, I am 17 years old and I have been diagnosed with Chiari Malformation.

It all started September 2011, when I started to get really bad headaches. Doctors had no idea what it was because my symptoms were not adding up to what they studied about Chiari.

I started a new high school in September. Mount De Sales Academy is the best school I have ever gone to. When I started, the best thing I loved was you could actually sit down and talk to a teacher without being terrified. Also, it was an all girl school which means everyone basically understood everyone. Every day at school I’d had random girls come up to me wishing me a good day even seniors! I was so surprised on how nice everyone truly was, and it was cool to actually be noticed for once. Now switching from public to private school isn’t the easiest thing to do but, I felt I had enough courage to do it. All of my life I thought I had A.D.D. turns out I actually have something else. My grades were not so good and my headaches were getting out of control. Some people thought I was just stressing because of my new school but I’ve felt stress before and I knew this was nowhere near it.

So every day I went to school living my life, trying to succeed but out of nowhere I started to get these terrible headaches. And I’ve had headaches before but none like this. I had a horrible headache that it’s hard to explain but it felt like as if someone was punching the back of my head. It was a very unusual feeling. So, I was freaking out because I’ve never had a headache like this before and my mom called the doctor, but the doctor had no idea what to do.

That day, I was so sore in the back of my head my doctor said “take Ashley to Saint Agnes emergency room” so my parents drove me there and we waited in the waiting room till they could come and fix my headaches. St. Agnes checked me out and said you are going to get MRIs and if anyone knows me I can’t sit still for a long period of time so I was thinking, this will be very challenging. St. Agnes took MRIs of my head and my chest because recently I have been having trouble breathing. The results came back and they said my brain looks fine but my heart's missing a valve, to hear that is the scariest thing as a teenager.

So, days after the MRI my parents set up an appointment with a cardiologist and he did tests on my heart and said there is nothing wrong my heart is in perfect condition. Right away I thought we need to see another doctor! What if there is something wrong with my brain?

We got an appointment at Johns Hopkins Neurology. They looked at my MRIs and saw my brain tonsils were hanging low. I thought to myself what the heck are brain tonsils? The doctor describe to my parents and me I have Chiari Malformation. So, we tried some medicine they gave me and they said come back if it happens again.

Maybe it was 3- 4 days after the appointment at Johns Hopkins I was in the ER at Johns Hopkins. I’ve never been to any hospital besides St. Agnes so this was a new thing. The doctors gave me medicine thru an IV and Benadryl so I could sleep. I woke up the next day with a little headache on a scale 1- 10 it was a 4. I thought YES! My worrying is over I can finally go back to hanging with my friends and get back to school! But I was wrong...

Shortly after a week I was back into the hospital with dizziness, a headache, and insomnia. My headache on a scale 1-10 was a 10. I was upset my headaches came back it seemed as if none of the medicine were working.

Months went by and every day I had a headache whether it was a 4 or up to a 10 I have lived suffering these headaches since day one. It’s kind of like a roommate that you don’t like, they just won’t leave!

November through December I had headaches back to back, the doctors just kept experimenting with the medicines to see what would help. I was giving up and getting angry that the medicines were failing.

So my mom tracked down a headache specialist at the University of Maryland and we got an appointment with him. I met with him and he gave me new medicine and told me to eat anything that has a lot of salt. I thought this guy is crazy, but hey I’m not complaining I love salt.

So I went back to school and I had another headache, so the nurse knew the plan call my mom and get me some rest.

Never in a million years would I have thought I had something wrong with my brain or to have brain tonsils hanging too low in my skull.

Well, my headaches increased but this time it was January and I’ve been out of school for 3 weeks. The worst feeling is being behind in school and the scary thought I might have to get held back haunts me every night.My headaches have become untamable and the medicine at University of Maryland seems to make my head hurt worse.

So I went back to the ER but this time I’ve never been to the University of Maryland ER so here’s to another adventure to solve my headaches. The medicine they gave me thru a shot and an IV was the same medicine that makes my headaches feels worse. I just wanted to get out of there. An hour after the ER I went and got more MRIs done and the machines noise made my head hurt more than I came with. So I went home in my bed and I have been here for about a week since my last hospital visit to the ER.

Yesterday I went to Johns Hopkins Neurology to ask if there is anything else we can do. All I got from the doctor was “ the only thing is surgery, but it may not even solve the pain of your headaches, and once you get surgery there is no turning back” “ Ashley what do you think” What was going thru my mind was how can you ask a 17 year old girl if she wants brain surgery?

So my mom called the doctor at University and asked him if there is anything else we can try before we decide to do surgery and we have an appointment tomorrow to find out.

You would have never thought I would have Chiari Malformation or thought how hard it is for me to go thru this as a teenage girl. Every day I pray that this will go away or will be solved. But I am very thankful for my friends & family, my school, my church and anyone who is praying for me out there, everyday is a new day and I’m wishing my headaches would just stop.

I am Ashley Witzke and I have Chiari Malformation.