Hi Patty, I am giving you my email address, should you or Letitia have any questions / comments. It is:
acrobaticfan@yahoo.com
I had a craniotomy back in April, and my recovery went very well. The reason why I had the brain surgery was because I had had gamma knife in Aug '04 for one brain met. It did shrink over the winter time, but unfortunately it grew back in the same spot in the beginning of the new year. Not only did I have the craniotomy, but my rad onc had decided to implant a handful of radiation seeds onto the cavity of the brain met. I had asked him why, he said that sometimes the original met was targeted correctly and did shrink, but there might have been some micromets surrounding the stem of the original met and THAT grew. The radiation seeds are just one alternative of doing "direct" treatment to a tumor site(s).
And keep in mind that sometimes brain MRI's could show images "larger" than mets were actual in size, because edema (swelling) could light up as well. This is called "fully enhanced imaging." That occured in my case. We had previously thought my tumor was large, so my surgical team were very pleased to find that the tumor was HALF its size. It was just my surrounding edema that misled us of the tumor size.
I believe that Letitia and I had tumors in different areas, since mine was just located in the lower left cerebellum, so it didn't affect my vision nor contigence <spell?>. The only side effect of my post-surgery period time was just a stiff neck for a few days. Also, I was not allowed to drive for the first 3 weeks, just in case of a possible seizure, which I did not have any.
Please tell Letitia that I will be thinking of her and sending positive vibes her way. A craniotomy is not as bad as you might think! :-) She is blessed to have you as a caring cheerleader on her side! :-) Hugs ~ JO.
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