Hidden Clues

I read two great books this weekend, both about brain tumor survivors: "I Had Brain Surgery - What's Your Excuse" and "Curve Ball - When Life Throws You a Brain Tumor". I thoroughly enjoyed both of them - the women who wrote them displayed great humor, which I think is mandatory in the brain tumor business. Both authors talked about how they discovered their brain tumors. In both cases, they had missed or ignored early signs. Which got me to thinking about my early warning signs - yes, the ones I ignored or failed to recognize...

Probably the earliest clue I had was a good two years before I was diagnosed. I had decided that I wanted to include yoga classes in my weekly quest to do things for myself. And it really pissed me off that I was the only one in the class who, no matter what, could not do a tree pose. It didn't matter how much I flailed around, there was just no standing peacefully on one foot whilst the other rested on the opposing knee. Nope, not gonna happen. I remember thinking at the time "Jeez, I'm barely 50 and my balance is already starting to go."

Little did I know that this was the first sign that something had invaded my head and was getting cozy with my auditory nerve. Huh.

For at least a year before diagnosis, I was noticing a decline in the hearing on my right side. At some point, I switched my headset from my right to my left ear. And I ignored the occasional "swooshing" noise in my right ear. Well, my dad had lost the hearing in one of his ears when he was in his 30's - I figured it was some hereditary thing. Best to just ignore it. It wasn't until Willie locked himself out of the house one morning and activated the burglar alarm when trying to re-enter that I got worried. You see, the burglar alarm was going off for several minutes and I never heard it. Granted, I was sleeping on my left side with my faulty ear facing the world. But still... I mean, have you HEARD those damned things?? They are like air raid warnings. Yep, that kinda freaked me out. I made an appointment with an audiologist that very day fully expecting that I would be fitted for a hearing aid. Instead, I was fitted for a fat graft and a titanium plate. Talk about getting the fuzzy end of the damned lolly pop!

Never crossed my mind that I had a tumor growing in my cranial cavity! Now, I don't want to scare anyone out there who may be suffering balance and/or asymmetrical hearing loss ... I'm just saying you may want to pay attention.

You know that expression that when you are a hammer, every problem looks like a nail? Well, when you've had a brain tumor, every symptom looks like a cranial invader. I think everyone in my family rushed to see an audiologist after my little adventure. (I'm happy to say, not a brain tumor in the bunch!)