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 Each day feels new, and my memory of the one before is faint. I’m learning to adapt. |
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In September 2019, a seizure revealed a lime-sized meningioma pressed against my hippocampus—the part of the brain that governs memory and language. The doctors said it was benign, but benign didn’t mean harmless. Surgery removed the tumor, and three days later I opened my eyes to a new reality. I could walk, I could talk, but when I looked at my wife, her name was gone. I called her Precious—the only word I could find. A failure of memory, yet perhaps the truest name of all. Recovery has been less cure than re-calibration. Memory gaps are frequent. Conversations vanish. I had to relearn how to write, letter by halting letter. My days are scaffold by alarms, notes, and calendars. When people ask how I am, I don’t list symptoms or struggles. I simply say, “Seven Degrees Left of Center.” It’s not an answer—it’s who I’ve become. |
| The next greatest gift to independent thought is writing those thoughts down. The hardest thing about writing thoughts down is not watching the errors grow on screen, at least in my experience. I get caught up in the errors, and I lose my thoughts because a misspelled word trips the process. I can't help but look at the screen as the letters appear. Then, my brain can't move past the errors to the end. I am forcing myself not to look at the screen to get these thoughts out of my brain and onto the screen before editing. Oops, I looked! Crap, now I lost my thoughts and have to fix errors. I'll be right back ... I may need to use an older text editor that doesn't catch mistakes. How about copying and pasting for corrections? Do you have any suggestions? |
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Sending prayers for continued improvement and recovery 
