One Month Ago Today We Found My Wife Had a Brain Tumor

A lot has certainly happened in the last month, and we know the dates only too well, since today is our 10 month wedding anniversary.

My wife has not been well for at least six months, as many of you who read my articles know. Christmas Eve she finally managed to see an Ear, Nose and Throat specialist to see why she had severe balance problems, and he ruled out her having any inner ear problems, and made an appointment for her to have an MRI scan.

She had the scan on 4th January, and 3 days later, at 8:30am on a Friday morning, she got a phone call asking her to come to the hospital later that morning.

You don't get called back quickly like that for nothing, so we knew it wasn't going to be good news, but when we found out that she had a large brain tumor and that they wanted to admit her the same day, we quickly began to fear the worst.

Since we took over half a lifetime to find each other, we both had half jokingly said before that all we needed now was for one of us to get sick. And so our worst fears suddenly became a reality.

So on Friday, the same day that we found out she had a tumor, she was admitted to hospital, put onto steroids to stabilize the tumor and to reduce the fluid levels that were dangerously high, and then we just had to wait and see what else the doctors had to tell us.

First, they told us that this was a rare type of tumor, one that they find less than 2% of the time, and that sometimes is a secondary result of other tumors. So we waited, another day for her to have a full body scan, and then until the following day when the doctor gave her the results.

All of us had been practically panicking and not been able to sleep, worrying what the next day might bring, and family and friends from around the world had been sending out good wishes and praying for us, but the news was excellent, there were no other tumors, and the one she had was almost certainly benign.

So in one way, we were able to breathe a sigh of relief, but still knew that a major surgery would be required to remove the tumor, and it may or may not separate from the brain easily. The other big question also remained, would Debbie still have balance and co-ordination problems, or would her brain return to normal following surgery.

The surgery took place the following Thursday, she went down to the operating theater at 8:30am. We waited, and waited, expecting her to be moved to the recovery area by early afternoon. I left work early afternoon, went to the hospital and waited. Every hour I called the nursing station and they said she was still in the recovery area, but all was ok.

4pm came and went, nothing. 5pm came too, and I was getting really edgy.

An hour before I had got frustrated at being in a small waiting room, with people coming and going from visiting people in the High Dependency Unit, some crying, most of them showing concern. I knew that Debbie had to come up from the operating room in an elevator, so I checked where these were, and there was a table and chairs there, and so there I sat for a good hour, just wishing and hoping.

I called Debbie's daughter, who was going to come and visit when she had come out of surgery, and just as we were on the phone, the elevator doors opened, and a mop of familiar curly red hair was resting on the pillow on the bed.

Debbie was still too far out of it to realize that I was there, but as they headed for the High Dependency Unit, where Debbie would be for the next day, the nurse gave me a big Thumbs Up and a smile, and I knew things would be ok.

Well to cut a long story short, the surgery went fine, Debbie spent the next 4 days in hospital, then returned home the following Tuesday.

Today is our 10 month anniversary, just one month to the day since we found out that she had a large brain tumor. Already she seems back to normal, she has her balance back, and her co-ordination is back to normal. She has even been off pain killers for the last 2 days.

She is still tired, which is natural, and having not been able to do very much for the last six months, and then being in hospital, her muscles have weakened, so we need to build those back up again.

Her hairdresser came to the house last week, trimmed her hair, which had not been cut for months, since she couldn't go out of the house for fear of falling over, and it had been cut/shaved for surgery as well.

She now looks and feels better, and we went down to the river for a nice walk at the weekend, and also to a local pub for a meal.

This year, after having got married and having to more or less put life on hold for much of last year, we hope to get our life back together, and Debbie hopes to be able to go back to work as well after Easter.