Well, here I am

(Photo taken by Kevin today at Woodhouse Fish Company, where I can't get enough of the clam chowder nor of the lobster roll and fries.)

It's hard to believe I've survived three separate surgeries to my head in two months, let alone all the ups and downs of varying degrees of left-side disability. The human body is truly amazing. I was a bit nervous about the actual surgery this time. Last time, I mentally checked out to another plane as soon as the ER doctor told me I needed surgery, so poor Robert, as my medical power-of-attorney, was tasked with signing the consent form. At least he had the knowledge that that first tumor was life-threatening to guide him. I was choosing to gamble that Dr. Lavery could remove that little fluid sac without harm against suffering worse brain injury and losing even more left-side function. I'm not a very lucky gambler, based on my one trip to Las Vegas, but this time fortune smiled. Now that all of the mass that was pressing on my control center is gone or going, about 50% of my hearing, 30% of my arm and 70% of my leg are back.

I'm having to limit visits and outings with visitors to one lunch plus one dinner each week depending on how many med apptmts I have that same week. There are a lot of sweet, caring friends that want to visit right now, but I'm having to be chintzy with the social so I can get lots of napping in. Kevin is my virtual sleep-out roommate for the near-future anyway, and I have him in just about every day to cheerfully perform most of the little chores and errands around the place. As my arm improves, I'll need him less, and around that time my capacity for visiting will increase, too.

Yesterday's hand grasp breakthrough punctured every remaining pessimism balloon about my chance of full recovery and I can really envision myself back to normal, both in physical and mental abilities, enjoying life and creating art again.

My walking has really improved and I'm able to push myself on that front a little more each day, both in the distances I walk and in the number of reps of the leg exercises I do. Same with the arm exercise reps, but I have a lot more function to gain back there and until I get more muscle tone back from what was lost during the totally dead time, the regained neural control doesn't have the supportive strength to continue developing. I do the exercises twice a day without fail, because I am the model patient, after all, plus I'd really like to have most, if not all, of the hand back by the end of the year.

As a special treat for the "poor li'l boy who had to spend Thanksgiving in the hospital" I went online shopping the other night and bought my self a new Mac Book and an iPad. I'm switching teams, and going Apple. I can't believe that five years ago I had to buy a huge Dell tower to get the storage of something that is now the size of a notebook. I'm looking forward to getting rid of all that equipment and all the cord and wire mess, and having a nice clean surface to my desk again.

I see Dr. Liu for surgery follow-up tomorrow, so I'll post again after that.