By the time evening had settled on the sleepy town of Winnipeg, that cold autumn day, my head felt like the Japanese fighter pilots, in this case Dr. West and his team, had blasted the shit of the landscape know as my brain. Unlike Pearl Harbour, it won’t go down in the annals of history as the great battle that awoke a sleeping giant in the Second World War, however, it will never be forgotten in the my own personal battle with Achmed!
Oddly enough, instead of waking me (not that I am considered a giant by many people over the age of two) it pretty much put me to sleep for two weeks. Today, almost four weeks post-nuclear blast, I am finally starting to feel like I have survived the surgery and my life is starting to get back to normal. I still get tired easily, and mornings are more often harder than easier, but the dizziness is gone; the headaches are really tame for the most part; the jaw burning in not as regular as it was; my hand numbness has dwindled down to a slight tingle and the numbness in my face has lessened. I have about a 30% hearing loss in my right ear, and that is permanent, but it seems to be stable.
In the picture above, Achmed is painted red to easily pick out. The white mass he is pressing up against is my brainstem... enough said!
The events of October 28, 2009 are etched into my memory like a diamond cutting glass. Every smell, movement, conversation, needle, sound and worry are still lingering in the back of my mind. The day of my surgical blast, there were two other people on my ward getting treated as well... unfortunately for them, their prognosis was not nearly as positive as mine. If I didn’t know how lucky I am before I got out of bed that day, I certainly knew how lucky I am by the time I got back in it.
My day started with a 4:30 alarm. Even on a good day, that is not really a great way to begin... when you know that the potential, however small it may be, is that this may be the last time you ever actually get out of bed, you savour every moment of hauling your tired ass to the shower. I think I felt every drop of hot, steamy water run down my skin that morning, and I don’t believe I could name a moment in time when my senses were more in-tune with my surroundings. Only if I could have been on top of a mountain, or lying on a hot sunny beach, or at a concert... it almost seems like a waste of an experience for that sensation to be in a clean and comfortable hotel room.
The drive to the hospital was uneventful... there is not a lot of traffic on the road at 5am. By 6am I was in my hospital bed getting my vitals taken for the record. With a heart rate of 51 and an almost perfect blood pressure, Janis the nurse decided that I was calm and coherent and DID NOT need a sedative... and the valium that I was looking forward to, and possibly the only thing that I was looking forward to other than this whole mess being over, was taken from my grasp like snatching candy from a young child. I am pretty sure that the expression on my face would have been the same as that young child if I had been allowed to have a coffee and was completely awake!
Then Lynn the nurse showed up at my bed with a tray that looked similar to the torture tray that you see at the dentist office. She then took the liberty of inserting the biggest needle I had ever seen, directly into my arm, which was to stay there for the whole day so it could serve as a sort of needle port for all of my needles. This needle port was in the bend of my left elbow, and even though I was technically allowed to bend my arm, every time I did, the pain shot though me like a bolt of lightening. If I had been older and out of shape, they may have thought I was having a heart attack the first time it happened.
After all this was ready, it was time for “Meet the Surgeons” which is nothing like “Meet the Press” for any of you who watch that show. Obviously I had met Dr. West, but I still had to meet Dr. Schroder. These two guys are the nicest, most helpful people, and hopefully and by all accounts, the best at their trade. That doesn’t change the fact that I hope I never see either one of them again, especially when the literal translation to “meet the surgeons” is “go get a halo brace installed in your skull”.
Oddly enough, instead of waking me (not that I am considered a giant by many people over the age of two) it pretty much put me to sleep for two weeks. Today, almost four weeks post-nuclear blast, I am finally starting to feel like I have survived the surgery and my life is starting to get back to normal. I still get tired easily, and mornings are more often harder than easier, but the dizziness is gone; the headaches are really tame for the most part; the jaw burning in not as regular as it was; my hand numbness has dwindled down to a slight tingle and the numbness in my face has lessened. I have about a 30% hearing loss in my right ear, and that is permanent, but it seems to be stable.
In the picture above, Achmed is painted red to easily pick out. The white mass he is pressing up against is my brainstem... enough said!
The events of October 28, 2009 are etched into my memory like a diamond cutting glass. Every smell, movement, conversation, needle, sound and worry are still lingering in the back of my mind. The day of my surgical blast, there were two other people on my ward getting treated as well... unfortunately for them, their prognosis was not nearly as positive as mine. If I didn’t know how lucky I am before I got out of bed that day, I certainly knew how lucky I am by the time I got back in it.
My day started with a 4:30 alarm. Even on a good day, that is not really a great way to begin... when you know that the potential, however small it may be, is that this may be the last time you ever actually get out of bed, you savour every moment of hauling your tired ass to the shower. I think I felt every drop of hot, steamy water run down my skin that morning, and I don’t believe I could name a moment in time when my senses were more in-tune with my surroundings. Only if I could have been on top of a mountain, or lying on a hot sunny beach, or at a concert... it almost seems like a waste of an experience for that sensation to be in a clean and comfortable hotel room.
The drive to the hospital was uneventful... there is not a lot of traffic on the road at 5am. By 6am I was in my hospital bed getting my vitals taken for the record. With a heart rate of 51 and an almost perfect blood pressure, Janis the nurse decided that I was calm and coherent and DID NOT need a sedative... and the valium that I was looking forward to, and possibly the only thing that I was looking forward to other than this whole mess being over, was taken from my grasp like snatching candy from a young child. I am pretty sure that the expression on my face would have been the same as that young child if I had been allowed to have a coffee and was completely awake!
Then Lynn the nurse showed up at my bed with a tray that looked similar to the torture tray that you see at the dentist office. She then took the liberty of inserting the biggest needle I had ever seen, directly into my arm, which was to stay there for the whole day so it could serve as a sort of needle port for all of my needles. This needle port was in the bend of my left elbow, and even though I was technically allowed to bend my arm, every time I did, the pain shot though me like a bolt of lightening. If I had been older and out of shape, they may have thought I was having a heart attack the first time it happened.
After all this was ready, it was time for “Meet the Surgeons” which is nothing like “Meet the Press” for any of you who watch that show. Obviously I had met Dr. West, but I still had to meet Dr. Schroder. These two guys are the nicest, most helpful people, and hopefully and by all accounts, the best at their trade. That doesn’t change the fact that I hope I never see either one of them again, especially when the literal translation to “meet the surgeons” is “go get a halo brace installed in your skull”.
I need to take a break now, lunch is over and I am starting to get queasy thinking about the next part.
From Achmed and Me... Live Life!
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