​Introducing Morris 

FRIDAY

 

HOW DO I MAKE IT THROUGH THE WEEKEND??

 

This was the question I was asking of my self bleary eyed and slightly less together with things! Then, again right on cue ten o clock friday morning sitting in the work cupboard the phone rings and it's the consultant. He had made it in through the snow and wanted to see me! Now as comforting as it is that he made that effort. The question in my slightly paranoid brain was now. "Why, it must be really bad?"

 

 I had to get used to being irrational and dramatic one minute then completely normal and philosophical the next . There really was no level-ness behind my thoughts. I still only knew I had a "tumour" nothing more.

 

The trouble was, he might have made it in but I was in London Bridge the other side of a very snowy and icy motorway! What did it matter? I absoloutely needed to see him. To find out for myself what all this "acoustic neuroma"  business was! I wanted to meet my morris. See his picture. 

 

 After the most tortuous journey ever through black ice in the back of a cab where the windows were misted up (including the front!) it was freezing and the sat nav battery was dying. Remember that wine from last nights party... ? Well, my clever friend packed it and I "sipped" it on the way!! Well required!  Eventually Rosalynn and I arrived at the hospital

 

When you turn up at reception and the clerk is the only staff member there because the hospital is shut and then she tells you your name before you speak it you'd normally feel a little special!  But this instance I didn't feel special,  I didn't feel well treated,  I felt I had taken the longest journey in my history to get here when no one else was and I just wanted to know why.

 

In his room the consultant sat us down in front of his computer. I was actually exhibiting a calm and relaxed, joking demeanour. All I wanted to do was make this easy for him! Funny how we work as people.

 

His opening gambit: "I may have told you it was small on the phone. It isn't"  This was ok, I could take this, that was a damage limitation lie he'd used! It was when  he showed us the pictures and Rosalynn grabs my knee and starts breathing all dramatically that it gets real!! So here I am, not really seeing what I'm supposed to be looking at, recognising the doctor has come into work, in the snow, just for me and the neuro nurse is hyperventilating!  Remarkably I just turn to him and say, "It looks like a nice one!!"

 

I don't think you can really prepare yourself for any bad news however it is laid out. I wouldn't have expected to be laughing and joking and saying it's all ok that you nearly missed it! But I was. I resigned myself to the a place of knowing it was what it was and my only choice was to cut it out. 

 

Simply, mine was about 4cm in size. It had been growing for at least ten years. I had adjusted to this really well as it had just been pushing for space in my head. I had a few odd symptoms that I could now attribute to Morris but nothing really big. It was sitting against my brainstem making it shift across. 

 

I didn't ask all the questions I wanted, I had't thought of them until I left, but I did come away with a picture on my mobile of my brain on his screen. This was invaluable. For a start I wanted to look at my googly eyes! Second, I needed to keep reminding myself that this was in there. This was serious. 

 

Over and over that day I asked Rosalynn if this was bad. I couldn't quite believe it was true and before I could tell people I needed to accept it myself. I needed to know if I had a right to be scared, to be dramatic, to cry, to worry. Or if this was just a case of just have some simple surgery and have it out.

 

Well... regardless of how big or bad yours or the one you're thinking about is, its not good. This is the brain. It's fragile and it's scary and it's the control centre so do be justified in feeling worried and thinking this is not the best thing that you could get if you picked a health crisis. Remember though that in most cases an acoustic neuroma is a sealed unit outside of your actual brain so hopefully it can be removed without damaging your brain itself.

 

Travelling home thinking of all the outcomes, deafness, facial paralyses, dizzyness, balance. Short of the risk to my brain stem as it was pushing on that, I couldn't help but breathe out with the enormity of this situation.

 

I can joke about the situation now, I'm on the other side. Whilst this was all happening I could still do that though.. It really makes you think differently about so many things. You will go up and down. Be ok and then really worried. It's all really normal. This is bad, it's your head, your life and your future. One of the few situations where the treatment will leave you with more symptoms than you went in with. So I give you permission to feel a little hard done by right now. It will change and it will improve. Honest. Check out the reflections from the others to see that it's not just me living a normal life now.