Tag: Tampa General Hospital
Regarding surgery and the menace that is NF2
There’s another aspect to talk about regarding life and where things for me stand at three weeks after I had an emergency brain operation which I talked about last week. What I focused on squarely during that write-up was post-op and the world I was involved in as I tried to grasp reality again. Just for the sake of throwing out the key words: Delusions, mental lapses, reincarnation.
Yeah, but what about before all that, what about pre-op?
While I have no recollection of Tuesday, December 6th and the events that led to surgery, I can remember life leading up to this incident just fine. And in the days before December 6th, it did come up where I thought of grander concepts and my medical condition in general. And I didn’t want anything to do with a process of medicine.
Let’s take a step back here and start with my condition: A rare neurological disorder called Neurofibromatosis Type 2. I’m deaf by way of it. I’ve had a few operations to remove tumors in my back and head. I know all the fun and games of the hospital (…which further makes me pissed off at the “ICU” I dealt with earlier in December, which was nothing of the sort, but I digress). At 37 years old, the concept of NF2 treatment is what pre-op was about. My thoughts leading to Tuesday, December 6th were a shrug and a rude hand gesture or two toward NF2. While the menace was and is part of my life, I wanted to live my life firstly and forget about the medical condition. I wanted to be and not get lost in MRIs or neurological clinic visits and such. It’s those aspects that dominated thoughts of pre-op: The fact I was overdue to have a scan or see a neurologist just for shits and giggles.
Being is what life is about; most of us toil through what our world offers. That’s what I wanted; not to get distracted by what could happen if I don’t, but to foil away against what was happening with life. NF2 can go fuck itself, and if it was going to kill me then oh well, too bad, so sad.
Yeah, and then we move to today and where I am at the moment and I’m ready for war. Like I said in the write-up the other day, I was dead post-op. Knowing that (or experiencing that) riles me up inside. I had to experience this shit and you’re still a genetic menace in my body? Fuck you. Fuck you, dearly [Editor note: f-bombs are fun sometimes and fitting]
I’ll have an MRI in the next six months, I’m sure, and will likely see one neurologist or another just to have a social sphere and good times… All because tomorrow is dictated by what the disease brings to the table. I’ll still foil and toil away at life as it matters, but this genetic condition ain’t playing well with me and I sure as shit don’t want to be nice in return.
Surgery, mental state…. All the fun and games of an emergency operation
Where I am sitting tonight is two-weeks after an emergency brain operation that came out of nowhere. And in reflection, two weeks ago upon regaining a conscious state post-op, I was dead, due to be reincarnated. I didn’t know about surgery, I just knew that I was waiting to be picked up by someone else and move forward into a new life with them as a partner.
I keep reflecting and can just assure you very much I have no recollection of Tuesday, December 6th [author’s note: I got dates wrong for the week this went down; my situation began on Monday, December 5; memory is weak if not nil on that date as well]. One piece of news I found out was that I was ambulanced to Tampa General Hospital, and that memory actually surfaces (but not clearly). Truly, though, things did not clarify at all until I was in a supposed ICU area on Wednesday that was to be the centerpiece for reincarnation. As someone who has had many a surgery in the past and knows Intensive Care Units, this wasn’t one. This felt like the dorm at a college, minus the social interaction. This wasn’t a high-end facility either, it was a waiting area with TV promo video.
Folks, does that seem random? It’s delusional, and that’s where I was for most of that week. It’s how far gone I was. Oh, and Wednesday I found out that I had died in a car accident with my parents. That’s what I remember. I’d find out I had nails in my head and such and didn’t know the extent of my injuries (or what really happened). I just was gone and in a process of becoming again.
I write this random stuff down and it sounds crazy. That’s how far gone I was post-op.
It wasn’t until Saturday, December 10, that I knew I was alive (and the reincarnation thing was a delusion). I had moved to a show-area on the Tampa General Hospital 4th floor and things had taken a more life-defined theme. Things were happening and everything was go-go-go, not the ultra laid-back, no-interaction crap of the days before. I wasn’t lost. At the same time, I still didn’t get what had happened to me. It wouldn’t be until later that weekend where I got told directly by family and friends about what I had gone through.
Does any of this make sense? It shouldn’t. It just shows that John J. Fonts Esq. was in a very odd place the week of December 6, 2016. Where he is now is recovering from surgery. Mentally, I’m spot on and ambling forward as I should, with physical ailments holding me back mightily (a fight to deal with). Two weeks ago? I don’t know how it started, and in general I ambled through crazy until reality reintroduced itself to me and I got back to the land of the living.
the fallout
So where was I?
Oh, yeah… Dwelling on inevitability. Surgery. All that joyous stuff that makes life grand for me. August 7th, 2007 was an extremely surreal experience in that my focus had to be elsewhere instead of impending doom and gloom (thank you Oren Koules, Jim Sherrin and Doug Maclean). Surreal may be a strong word for it. A grand, welcome distraction might be a better phrasing. Having a friend come over to spend some time with me and further distract me only aided to things.
The next day was no better – wanting to deal with that story and yet lying in a hospital gurney most of the day while waiting an angiogram: the pre-operative procedure as bad as I dreaded (but with a great staff of physicians trying to deal with my issues and some medical breakthroughs since my last angiogram that kept me from being bed ridden).
You know, I feel like I’m being shallow in the details but at the same time — there weren’t many meaty details before I was trucked off to the ninth floor at Tampa General Hospital where I stayed overnight before surgery. Besides pain issues with thanks to the angiogram, everything went swimmingly.
And how can I properly term my stay at TGH besides saying I was surrounded by good omens and positive energy? Days previous to surgery, I’d gotten a religious card sent to me with the only Patron Saint I identify with. It’s sorta grim but after I learned about him (and wrote about a poem where I invoked him) I didn’t see it as an ill omen as-so-much familiarity. I can deal with familiarity.
When I got to the ninth floor, who greets me warmly but an old friend from High School who works as an Registered Nurse on the floor? It was good mojo to see her, realize who she was and have come right up to me and say hi.
Another thing that was positive and yet drenched with negativity was a nurse I had overnight who I couldn’t understand due to her accent. She was warm, pleasant and tried her best to overcome things and I found myself mad that I had gotten frustrated with her.
