Survivor story: Joanne Fritz

I have survived two ruptured brain aneurysms, twelve years apart. The first occurred in July 2005, when my family and I were on vacation in Boothbay Harbor, Maine. One night, my younger son, Kurt, and I went to the movies and at the end, I stood up and immediately I was struck with intense searing pain and pressure. My son’s voice was muffled and distant. I could hear a strange gushing, pulsing sound that masked everything else. Somehow, I managed to stumble my way out to the parking lot, where my husband, Carl, was waiting for us in the car. I woke up the next afternoon in the intensive care neuro unit of the Maine Medical Center. I had suffered a rupture of a basilar tip aneurysm I hadn’t known existed. I was so weak, I thought I’d been hit by a truck. The ER doctors had drilled a hole in my skull and inserted the plastic tube that was now draining excess blood out of my brain. I’d had a subarachnoid hemorrhage, a Grade 2-3. My aneurysm sealed itself after rupturing but the arterial wall was so weak, it could rupture again at any moment. Therefore, my aneurysm was coiled by an interventional neuro-radiologist named Dr. Eddie Kwan.

Back at home in Pennsylvania, I found a neurologist who agreed to see me every year, mainly to keep track of my increasing headaches. He ordered MRAs every three years, and when the last test came back normal, he convinced me to get tested every five years instead. But less than five years later, in August 2017, I saw the neurologist for my annual headache check-up. My headache diary proved my headaches had become more frequent, around 15 a month. But he simply shrugged. Then I asked, “Shouldn’t I be getting an MRA this year?” He dismissed my concerns. “You can put that off. If you had another aneurysm, we’d have seen it by now.” Five weeks later, a small second aneurysm on my basilar artery ruptured. This time, it was a Grade 4 bleed. Oddly enough we were in Boothbay Harbor, Maine, again and twelve years had passed since my first aneurysm. I was rushed in a helicopter to Maine Medical Center.

I have no memory of any of this, nor of the next six months of my life. I spent a month in Maine Medical Center, followed by six weeks in rehab. After a month at home, in January 2018, several serious infections put me right back in the hospital for another month, this time in Philadelphia. After that, I had another six weeks of rehab.

More than two years have passed since that second rupture. Most days, I still don’t feel like myself. My balance is off, and I tend to careen around corners. My vision is worse, and I don’t drive anymore. Fatigue and nausea often overwhelm me.

I’ve found an incredible neurosurgeon at Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia, who repaired a third aneurysm that was found in May 2019, before it could rupture as the first two did. She wants me to have an MRI every year for the rest of my life. Finally, I have a doctor who listens and takes me seriously.