I am 22 and had a stroke

Hi,

I am 22 years old and about 2 months ago, i had a baby boy. when the baby was about 1 month, my ob put me on birth control pills. Then about 3 weeks later, i woke one morning with a terrible headache (so i was told, i have no recollection of that day) my mom told me i took my dad to work, came back and complained to my mother about the headache. I fell asleep for a awhile and was woken by my son. i asked my mom to feed him,while i fell back to sleep. While she was feeding him, she heard a funny noise on the baby moniter and went to my room and found me having a seizure. I went to the hospital and had two more. The doctors did a mri and cat scan and found a unknown matter in my brain. they thought it was a tumor. A few days later, I went to a different hospital and the doctors said it was just a blood clot and i had a mild stroke They also said a piece of my right frontal brain had died.I am now on warfarin and lovenox to thin out my blood. I have been on both for about a week and just want to know if there may be something else i can take to thin out my blood so the blood clot could get obsorbed. I just want to go back home to my baby, I am also taking an anti-seizure medication and it is working, haven't had a seizure since the first day, Do you think i could have gotten a stroke because of the birth control pills? i dont have a history of blood clots but i just wonder why i had a stroke when i am just 22.

[PaulMD]

Hi there.

I would advise against thinning out your blood too much as this would lead to serious forms of bleeding, from the stomach, intestines, lungs, and even inside the brain.  The clot that clogged the blood vessels in the brain causing the stroke cannot be fully dissolved by thinning out the blood.  This can be dissolved by using drugs such as streptokinase, but this should be done within the first few hours or minutes of stroke.  The part of the brain that has died is also unlikely to recover since brain cells are unable to regenerate.

The present strategies that your doctors are employing consist of thinning out the blood to a prespecified range (protime, INR test) just to prevent future strokes.

Another angle that I would like you to discuss with your doctors is the possibility of a disease called APAS (antiphospholipid antibody syndrome) which predisposes young individuals to have a stroke while young.

Regards.