UPDATED: Brain Surgery Day

 Marlene: Writing this post on Monday evening, and setting to go live at 6 am our time on Tuesday, September 8. At that time, we should be at the hospital. So no, Valerie, I'm not posting from the operating table!  :-) Technology is!

We had a joyful Monday as we got to spend time with both sets of kids. What a privilege! We had a photo shoot in Gage park, using the magnificent plants and flowers to play with backgrounds. Below is a quick collage of just a few shots.

Tripod, remote shutter release, various stops and poses and patient subjects.

Afterwards, we stopped at T by Daniel  and had the man himself serve us with his usual exuberance!
Thank you to so many people for love and care, messages and calls, concern and prayers. We can never thank you enough.
Off to bed now --- and Jenni will take over, posting a few times during the day as she gets updates from Arno. Remember to hit Refresh / reload if you come back later for updates!

Jenn (11.30am): Marlene and Arno made it to the hospital at 6am and were processed through very quickly by hospital staff. Arno sent this pic at a bit before 8am saying that they had an estimated 3 to 4 hour operation ahead and when I last followed up around 11.15am, it was still a work in progress.

12:30pm: Marlene is out of surgery. The doctors say that they were successful in removing most of the growth and preliminary analysis shows it to be benign. She will be kept in recover for a couple of hours and then moved to the after-surgery critical care area so that the staff can monitor her.

1:30pm: Arno sent a couple of pics of Marlene coming to with her head bandaging slightly visible in the second photo (the surgeons shaved a piece off near the top of her head ... very punk rock!). He says she is a bit groggy but is talking and seems to be doing okay.

5:00pm: Marlene is on her way to the critical care area. As you can see, she's already on the phone and checking in on people.

6:20pm: Marlene sent me a collage of what she sees from her bed right now with all of the cables and tubes hooked up to her. Says her head is a bit sore but mostly okay, and that her hair feels the weirdest right now! All stiff from the operation. She will be staying in this room until tomorrow afternoon and then should be moved to a shared room at that point. (TW: picture below includes a shot of the bandages, which are a bit bloody)

7:00pm: No coffee, but Marlene gets a liquid dinner (not that kind of liquid dinner...)

Brain Surgery Day

Writing this post on Monday evening, and setting to go live at 6 am our time on Tuesday, September 8. At that time, we should be at the hospital. So no, Valerie, I'm not posting from the operating table!  :-) Technology is!

We had a joyful Monday as we got to spend time with both sets of kids. What a privilege! We had a photo shoot in Gage park, using the magnificent plants and flowers to play with backgrounds. Below is a quick collage of just a few shots.

Tripod, remote shutter release, various stops and poses and patient subjects.

Afterwards, we stopped at T by Daniel  and had the man himself serve us with his usual exuberance!

Thank you to so many people for love and care, messages and calls, concern and prayers. We can never thank you enough.

Off to bed now --- and Jenni will take over, posting a few times during the day as she gets updates from Arno. Remember to hit Refresh / reload if you come back later for updates!

Surgery updates

Thyroid

Less than a month after his partial thyroidectomy, hubby already played softball again! The healing is amazing.
Below is a combination picture - taken less than 24 hours apart. The first one was taken shortly after surgery. Tape measure is around his neck to check for any swelling.
The next day, the tape measure was gone and he looked a little bit more "there"! The draining tube was removed about 24 hours after surgery and only left a small scab.

A week later, we had to go in for the stitches to be removed. Since it was only a single stitch, sort of like a blanket stitch (new to us!) I hardly had time to get the camera in place for a picture! He said it was more trouble to have the steri strips being pulled off than for the stitch to be removed.

The surgeon was happy with the result after seven days. We are still waiting for the pathology results of the removed half of the thyroid, though. I was hoping to have that ready and was holding off on this update for that reason.

Picture to the right was taken a week and one day after surgery, only hours after the stitch was removed.

Thank you for all the messages of concern and offers of help!

Meningioma

If you read a previous entry on this blog, you would know that I was diagnosed with a brain tumour, called a meningioma. My surgery is still scheduled for September 8 at Trillium hospital. By all accounts, their neurological department is excellent. (And it seems they have better coffee than Brampton Civic, which will be a plus! But I'm packing my rooibos teabags anyway.)

Realized last week I might need blood transfusion for my surgery. My sons have been blood donors for about 8 years, and I can use both their groups. I am A+; so is younger son and elder son is O+.  Called to ask if they can donate blood to be used for me, found out I would need about 2 litres during surgery. So that is in the works.

Blood Services Canada said  a parent can donate blood to be used for a child's surgery, but an adult child can't donate blood for a parent's surgery. Silly and makes utterly no sense! Now the surgeon's office is trying to let me know how we can go about using the boys' blood. Voicemail was garbled , though. I said if it is too much trouble, I'd just ask my sons and a few friends to go donate blood, which means the general pool gets replenished.

Oh yes, and the hair! So may people asked if I will have to shave my head. The surgeon said they'll shave what they need, but I decided to have fun with it. So did the hairdresser. She created a funky, spiky hairstyle, which will be cut once more before surgery and go quite a bit shorter. Another friend is making me a very bright hat so that people don't have to get sick when they look at me after surgery!

Here is a picture with a friend on the city plaza while we were enjoying the Farmer's Market. I'm the one on the right .... What do you think?

I'm still playing with it and learning how to do different things with the spikes. Part of it is adding some colour, using cream eye shadow. It works, and washes out with shampoo.

As for symptoms - headaches, fatigue (especially while working on the computer) and sometimes an unexplained twitch of the leg or arm might all have to do with the mushroom I'm growing in my head.

A very interesting year for us, indeed! 

Thank you to friends and family near and far, who carry us in thought and prayer. 

Mah Mushroom

People who visit this blog might have noticed the lack of regular posts the last few months. I stepped back from the activism to get help for Lyme patients, but thank the Lyme community humbly for a tribute they posted. A lot of things have been happening these last months, and this July, many of those might finally come to a head. I'll try to summarize in a succinct way! There are a few headings here below; skip or read at your own discretion, please.  :-)

The bruising

For more than a year now, weird, large, very sore black bruises have been appearing on my legs without any trauma.

I've once again been referred for many tests, including oncology / hematology. Blood taken - 18 vials on Halloween (how's that for irony! LOL) and then referred to the McMaster University Medical Centre in Hamilton for yet more tests. Twelve vials the first time and ten vials a month later. They are sure it is vasculitis, probably a complication of my Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA) but my rheumatologist doesn't agree. Those tests and visits kept me busy with no real answers, so I called it quits. I'm happy. Forget a diagnosis and I'll just deal with the bruises. And no, hubby didn't beat me up or kick me back at night when my Restless Leg kicks in! (Pun definitely intended.)

The boob

In April I had a mammogram as part of the Ontario screening program and was called back a week later for an ultrasound. There were "things" found in my left breast and I have to go back in October to have that checked out again. No worries, though, I wasn't going to post a picture of THAT!

The lump

In September last year, while on vacation, I noticed a large lump on the left of Arno's throat. We were out of the country but managed to see a doctor who called in a second opinion. Back in Canada, ultrasound confirmed a 7 cm (2.75 inch) nodule on his thyroid, and two more nodules on the right side.
 A needle biopsy found no cancer. The surgeon said the lump has to come out, though, and because it is so big, cancer is not completely excluded through the biopsy. However, even if it is cancer, it is very slow growing and should not be life-threatening. We have now been waiting nine months for a surgery date.

The collapse

In the middle of June, while we were busy making a batch of antipasto to have on hand for the summer, I felt weird. This was around 5 pm on Sunday night, June 14. While walking upstairs to collect laundry, I suddenly couldn't see, the stairs were jumping all over the place in my vision, I felt very confused and sort of out of it. My left side felt as if it was under water and had to be dragged along. On the landing I was even more confused, forgetting where I was going. I walked to the bathroom but had "forgotten" I had a left side and walked smack-dab and left boob first into the door jamb, rattling the house. Arno thought I had fallen down but I kept calling to him I couldn't see. I turned around, minus laundry, and tried going back downstairs - no, I don't know why! Told you I was confused! Almost fell off the stairs several times because I just couldn't focus. Back in the kitchen I felt like a padlock was hooked into my left cheek, pulling my whole face down. I tried to talk to Arno but he couldn't make out what I was saying, since my speech was slurred.

He made me sit on the floor while he finished bottling the sauce, where I looked up the symptoms for a stroke or mini-stroke (TIA). He drove me to Emergency where we were processed very quickly and into a room with ECG within half an hour. Two doctors gave him heck for not calling an ambulance - which would have taken me to the Stroke Centre. We didn't even know it existed.

The next test was a CT scan, which found a mass in the brain. Then an ultrasound of the neck veins. Around 11 pm yet another doctor came by and mentioned a few possible diagnoses. They were going to keep me for an MRI. Arno went home, and I spent most of the night on a cot in the busy ER, then a few hours in a corner of a hallway near the nurses' station in the Neuro ward.

An MRI confirmed a brain tumour called a Meningioma. I just dubbed it Mah Mushroom. Growing quietly in the dark. Yes, I had symptoms over the last few months but have mostly ignored them. I am even using a bath chair and handle, borrowed from a friend a few months ago because I felt unstable while taking a shower. A few times the headaches reduced me to tears. A feeling of a vice screwed tightly around my head has been ongoing for several months, as well as visual disturbances. I think my blocked left ear might also have something to do with it.

A Neurologist came by around 10 pm on the Monday evening. He spent a long time and said I have to be put on anti-convulsants to avoid seizures. What I had was not a stroke, but a seizure due to pressure on the brain. I was in hospital for four days, and the seizures continued on the left side until the meds kicked in by the Tuesday evening.

After just a week, my old bod went into its usual shenanigans and rejected the meds. I had hives, spots, galloping heartbeat, headache, sweats and shakes. So of course the meds had to be changed - or live with the seizures, which was not an option according to the doctor. I've now been on new meds a week, and so far, so good.

The tumour is near mid center membrane in brain, on top of the head, so might involve some of the large veins, possibly the bone of the falx and other things.

On July 7 I have an appointment with a neurosurgeon who will talk about the following steps, surgery or not, when and where.

I had to return my driver's license and am grounded until such a time as my doctor deems it would be safe to drive again. It might be several months, up to a year. But I have AMAZING friends who all swooped in and offered to drive me / us to and from hospital, to and from appointments, shopping, church and the like. How blessed are we???

Oh and guess what?? While I was in hospital, Arno finally got the call! His surgery is on July 15. What an interesting month for us!

Not knowing how things might progress over the next few days or weeks, I've set up a ......

Guest Author: 

Jenni - She's family, she is articulate and she is an artist. But most importantly, she said "yes" when I asked if she'd take on the job! When / if I have surgery, I might be out of it for a day or two. Friends (bless them!) and family want to be kept updated, hence asking Jenni to do the honours. The posts might be graphic, might include pictures, might sometimes be meant only for family and close friends. In that case, a post might be password protected for a while. Lots of "mights", I know, but guess that is where we are at this particular time.

Please check out Jenni's artwork! She has a website, a Tumblr account, Instagram and a deviantArt account. Her Bio is on The Caffeinated Rose Bride, with other links at the bottom of that post.

Jenni - as I see her (copyright Jenni)

The way she says she is! (copyright Jenni)

If you are still reading, take a break for bravery!
But thank you for caring. See you on the flip side.  :-)