Dazed and Confused

I’m writing this posting in familiar surroundings. It’s Saturday night at the Prince of Wales Hospital and I’m lying here in my favourite bed once again. The last couple of weeks have been interesting, to say the least.

Around 12 days ago, really strange things started happening inside my head (yes, even stranger than usual). It started with mild headaches, which would come and go in waves. They weren’t too severe and would shift pretty quickly with the help of painkillers. But then I started noticing some other odd things.

I began having problems with simple tasks -just writing a simple e-mail became difficult. I’d keep losing my train of thought and have to start over, again and again.

On top of that I’d constantly feel exhausted, no matter how much rest I had. I just wanted to sleep all the time and after waking up, I'd just want to sleep some more.

Then I started losing awareness of time. I remember waking up and getting ready for work on a Monday morning, only to realise that it was actually Sunday afternoon.

Next to go was my sense of direction. I would keep getting lost all the time, even in really familiar places like the lift lobby of the building where I work. On Monday, I walked into a shop and couldn’t find my way back out. The simple task of turning around and retracing my steps was just too much to handle, for no apparent reason.

At 2:30pm on Thursday, I went to see Professor Poon as a precaution. On hearing about my experiences, he immediately sent me for a CAT scan and asked me to wait behind for the results. When my scans came back, he described them as “frightening”. A huge build up of fluid inside my brain had caused the ventricles to blow up out of all proportion, a condition known as hydrocephalus. I wasn't allowed to leave the hospital and was admitted for emergency surgery.

By 10am the next morning, I was on the operating table, my head opened back up again.

Groundhog Day

I had to relive my surgery all over again, but this time the procedure would be different. He went in the same way, through the back of the head. But this time, instead of removing a tumour, his task was to install a ‘shunt’ in my brain – a valve that would allow the built-up fluid to drain away before it could cause any permanent damage. He then connected a long plastic tube to the shunt and fed it down the side of my head and neck, down the front of my chest and into my abdomen, where the fluid can drain off safely.

So now, as I sit here and write, I have a new valve in my head and a tube connecting my brain to my gut. The tube sits just under the surface of the skin so you can feel it if you rub against it. It hurts like a #### and I'm bald again. But it’s a damn sight better than being brain damaged.

The Luckiest Man Alive

Hydrocephalus is triggered by trauma to the brain, such as the surgery that I had a couple of months back. It's a risk that the Professor warned me about from the outset. If left unattended, it can be fatal, but through a combination of his experience, instinct and perhaps, divine intervention, mine was caught in time.

Professor Poon told me the tiredness that I was feeling was the precursor to going into coma. In other words, if I carried on sleeping, I might not have woken up again.

With that, I’d just like to say a big 'thank you' for your support and prayers this week and thank God for being by my side throughout.