Thursday, January 15, 2009

quick version

A lot of people have been asking me what's going on, so here's the quick rundown.
I have an acoustic neuroma, it looks like this:
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How they missed this in my CT scans 6 months ago is really weird.
It's a (benign) brain tumor that attaches itself to auditory and equilibrium nerves, like this (gross):
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It usually discovered in people 30-60 yrs old, and usually when it's smaller. It's so big that they can't let it keeping growing, or it will push up on my brain stem, mess up all my senses and (ultimately) kill me. I'm too young/it's too big for radiation (which would stop it from growing but only temporarily). So it's coming out, hopefully sometime in February, but at the rate things are going, who knows when. It'll be a long surgery, and I'll be at the hospital for about a million years (4-7 days maybe).
Means:
I will have a weird haircut.
I will have a killer scar.
I will have terrible balance for a while.
I will be deaf on left.
There's other (possible) side effects that are a little to grim to list.

The good news is, I did my taxes and already know how I'm spending my refund (not on teeth).

3 comments:

PithySarcasm said...

Sue, I am here to extend an invitation to "Girls with Brain Tumors are Hot" club (AKA: I've had my skull drilled open and human hands have touched my brain. You? No? Didn't think so.)

Membership requirements include: 1) brain tumor, 2) brain surgery, 3) shitty balance, 4) partial to full loss of one or more of the five senses, 5) major scar on your head, and 6) pictures of you with your head partially shaved.

I am happy to announce, that with you in the club, membership now stands at TWO!

LuLu said...

Hopefully you'll get Charles, the gorgeous black man with blue eyes, as your nurse like I did. I hope this doesn't change our plans to form the metal band Chinplate Rodleg. xoxo

sarah said...

i saw this and i thought of you

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,480084,00.html