My left hand

My new wheels

I have been keeping a journal since coming home from the hospital after brain surgery. I’m posting some of it today for any BITS readers curious about how I’m getting along.

Monday, 2/17/14. I’ve been wanting to write about my left hand and arm, which have been affected by this tumor. The numbness in them was the sign to me that I was developing some kind of neuro-problem. The neurosurgeons seemed disappointed when I told them afterward that I had not regained full use of them. Apparently, that had been on their wish list. Maybe mine, too, but I have been careful not to seem ungrateful that my left side has not deserted me completely. I still have use of my left leg and the ability to walk short distances without a roller-walker.

Bedside basics

But the numbness of my arm and hand are a mostly constant reminder that for a time, that part of my physical being is experiencing a kind of “brown out.” I wake in the morning with a heaviness that extends from my shoulder to my fingertips, and only thumb and index finger seem functional, though not with great reliability. I massage my left hand and wrist with my right, and something like feeling returns for a while.

Throughout the day, however, simple movements produce a frustrating comedy of unrealized expectations. Pulling on a tee shirt or sweatshirt is usually a challenge, the memory of how to do it colliding with the impediments. What was once an automatic function now requires my full attention, as I relearn the process, breaking it down into steps.

Almost back in the saddle

Tulips taking a bow, 2/9/14

As many of you reading this know by now, I was diagnosed in late January with a brain tumor, assumed malignant. On January 30, a neurosurgical team at Desert Regional Medical Center in Palm Springs went in after it. Removal was successful, and we now await full recovery.

I am at home with my wife, a tireless caregiver and patient advocate beyond measure or comparison. My daughter is also here for a time before returning to her home back East, reasonable travel weather permitting.

Blog. I expect before long to be blogging regularly again. The one hitch is that I have lost full use of my left arm and hand—a condition I hope is temporary. Single-handed keyboarding is a bit of a chore.

To be honest, after the kind of trauma that comes with literally having your cranium cracked, I worried that I would lose the capacity to continue what I’ve been doing here—thinking and writing about frontier fiction and westerns. As mental and physical energies have rallied, my concern about that has abated. If anything, I may come out on the other side of this more garrulous than ever. (You have been warned.)