Thank you for getting in touch with aphasiahope…the organization can be such a great resource for individuals experiencing communication difficulties like you are describing.
Anomia, or the difficulty in retrieving words, is classically described as you did…knowing what you want to say but being unable to “get it out”… often anomia results in paraphasic errors, where another word is used instead of the one that you intended. It may have some of the same sounds, belong to a similar category or even be a synonym for the one you wanted to say. Anomia is also a must-have symptom for the clinical diagnosis of “aphasia”. That is to say that if you have aphasia, you will have some level of word finding difficulty or anomia…the contrary, however, is not the case.. you can have anomia without having aphasia. Sometimes it’s a symptom of something else going on…
With a left frontal AVM, you could definitely be experiencing aphasia. In your note you did not indicate if you have had, or plan to have any surgery, … if this has been a new onset or if you have been dealing with it for sometime. I assume that you are being followed by a neurologist who can order a speech / language evaluation. This comprehensive assessment of language functioning will not only be able to put a label to what you are experiencing, but be able to provide you w/some strategies to get better! Remember that with aphasia, there is a possibility of deficits in any/all of the language modalities (reading, writing, listening and speaking), so you could experience the same frustrations in writing or reading that you do in speaking.
I encourage you to seek the evaluation and follow up w/an aphasia support group in your area. You can find this information here (www.aphasiahope.org) and at the National Aphasia Association website (www.aphasia.org). Please feel free to re-email should you have any additional questions for concerns.
Good luck.
Maura

>i have an avm on left frontal lobe also
>compresses the optic nerve. i loose my
>words..nouns i know what i mean but it comes out
>wrong word. i often do not know i have said it
>wrong..most of the time even..is this a form of
>aphasia is there a name for it?