Post-Surgery: You should see the other guy

It's not the brain surgery that's giving me issues post-surgery, it's the nose.

Packed up, still bleeding, taking medications to ease the pain and hurry up the healing, it's mess. I look like I survived twelves rounds vs. Tyson not a deviated septum.

It will take awhile to heal.

Tomorrow I Go Into Surgery

I may have posted a few words earlier on that I have a growth in my head - on the pituitary gland in particular - and because of where it is the growth is threatening my optic nerves.

So tomorrow I go in, a nose surgeon will fix a deviated septum first and then after that the neurosurgeon goes through a nasal sinus to drill into the skull, scoop out the growth, patch up the hole, and hope I don't leak any spinal fluid for the next few years.

This is the first major surgery I'm having ever since I was five years old. I had little comprehension what was going on, and it was just eartubes trying to straighten out my hearing for a few months.

I'm quite nervous about it.

The research on the surgery tells me the risks are minimal and that I should recover, but we're talking about my head here. And yes, you trump-worshipping nabobs, I have a brain worth keeping.

But I can't avoid it: If I don't get the surgery I'm going to lose my sight.

So I'm going in. It feels right now like getting ready for a plane trip: I have a huge fear of heights but if I gotta go somewhere I gotta go and I've flown enough times to treat it now as a mild annoyance. I'm trying to rationalize this as a plane flight.

The thing bothering me most right now is that my parents are here to help me out getting to the hospital and back, and making sure I'm good as I heal up. The thing is my Dad's a Fox News watcher, and I've had to suffer through far too much Tucker Carlson than I ever want to. Surgery would be less painful right now. I need Fox Not-News on my TV like I need a hole in my head (yes, I went there).

So in my mind, I'm traveling tomorrow morning.

I hope to see you on the other side.

If I don't make it though: AVENGE ME. STOP THE REPUBLICANS.

And put my Twitter messages into a book collection for posterity, it might be good for a library or two to keep.

Personal Status Report: Digging Into the Membrane

Well. This has been something on my mind for some time.

Literally.

I went to see about clearing out my sinuses back in June, and when I got a CAT Scan they found a lump in the middle of my brain.

Further MRI and exams point to a tumor on my Pituitary gland, which shockingly enough affects about one in five people. Most people live their lives not even aware of it. I hadn't, didn't have any of the obvious signs for it - severe sufferers will have frontal headaches behind the eyes - and in some respects didn't even think to look for it. My blood tests over the years didn't show much deviance in the hormones managed by the gland, although I've been a chronic depressive for years I dunno if this tumor caused all of that.

The thing is, the tumor pushes upward from the spot in the skull where the gland rests, which just happens to be right below the point where the optic nerves criss-cross. So that as the tumor grows, eventually it will push apart or even engulf those nerves, causing vision loss. I already have loss of outer edge (peripheral) vision based on the eye exams they gave me two months ago.

So the neurosurgeon and ophthalmologist are both saying I need the surgery.

No idea yet how much it's going to cost. All I know right now about the surgery is that they gotta go through the nose, scrape out the tumor (they know where not to scoop the Pituitary, here's hoping), and patch up the hole in my head so I don't leak out spinal fluids. It involves a stay in the hospital for at least two days, have to be off work for at least a week maybe two...

The horrifying thing is, of course, they'll be digging in my brain. As someone who prides himself on above-average intelligence, I dread what effects this will have on mah head, brah.

The risks are minimal, but my parents are telling me I'm way overdue for a Will just in case things don't go well.

I'll keep blogging until the day of surgery. We'll see how it goes from there.

Good luck and IO SATURNALIA, everybody.