A brain tumour???!

Just when you think everything is going so well!……

This has been totally bizarre in so many ways:

A phone call while on holiday while trying on a waterproof jacket in a changing room,

Thinking I was asymptomatic then realising I'm not, I've been having “episodes”. When is a headache a headache? When is an intense feeling of fear a panic attack and when is it Temporal Lobe Epilepsy?

A lot of emergency stuff, rushing into hospital for a possible arterial malformation, being checked out and then discharged late at night, not an emergency after all. Very dramatic, not in a good way.

Major planned operation cancelled twice, second time because I got Covid. Standard protocol, 6 weeks delay because of anaesthetic problems with Covid. A huge relief because I am terrified of the operation. But I still need it…

On the positive side:

Made me and my husband very close, less arguing, a lot of support and love

It being picked up so randomly at a Bio Bank MRI. (A struggle to feel grateful for, I’m only theoretically grateful at the moment.)

Journalling has been very useful giving accurate data of “episodes”

On the more difficult side:

I’ve still got to get through a MAJOR operation. Maybe 8 hours or longer. No official date as yet, probably October. I dread it but I also want to get on with it.

There are a lot of things I have to say goodbye to, maybe short term, maybe not (e.g alcohol, driving, boxing class). I’m on a load of medication and I’m the same person but I’m also a completely different person. I have stepped through a doorway into a new world. Everything I experience being reexamined in a new light. Is this a symptom or is it just me? What is “me” me, what is brain pressure? Does it actually make any difference? Especially as a lot of symptoms may be permanent, the epilepsy for a start.

I’m having to take life very easily. A lot of resting, self care to reduce the “episodes”. My life has become very, very low key. At times frustrating and limiting, I’m trying to get used to it, appreciate it as nice. Life is very up and down at the moment.