I’ve thought a lot about a means of producing a diary or log of my experience in battling this brain tumor thing I’ve been handed. It is a glioblastoma, which is highly malignant.

I am undergoing radiation and chemo treatments and thus far, three weeks into the treatments,  I am experiencing very, very little to no ill affects.

I had been experiencing approximately a headache per day for awhile – post-surgery. My surgery occurred in early March. At first, I was needing to take a headache pill about once per day. Over the last three weeks, I’ve needed a headache pill on only one occasion.

My reading and writing abilities took a hit due to the tumor and right after the surgery, I struggled to get back to work as a writer. Again, over the last three weeks, my reading and writing have significantly improved.

The most problematic is the hole within my peripheral field of vision, on the left side. This makes it a bit more difficult to type and is still slowing me up on writing a bit.

The improvement in these skills was very welcome. I hope I’ll see more advancement in the weeks and months to come. But the vision hole will likely be more difficult to overcome.

One therapy to improve my reading skills, one that I developed on my own, was reading the newspaper comics page. Sounds strange or comical enough, but it worked. I started doing this around mid-March and at first I struggle to get through each section,

But slowly, I was able to speed up the time it took me to read through it each day. Now, I’m nearly all the way back to normal is this area. At times, I still have to stop for a moment to pick up a word or two.

Why do I think the comics have been more helpful? – Because the fonts vary and it takes a bit more focus to read each strip.

PACK MENTALITY BLOG: Compassion - teamed with Science and Logic