About Me

In 2017,  I attended a UCONN hockey game with my husband (date night) two rows from the ice. About ten minutes into the first period, a puck came over and struck me right along the side of my right eye, just missing it. I was sent to Hartford Hospital for treatment. Scans revealed I had no skull fracture from the puck (thankfully) However,  I was told I had what's called a benign meningioma. Meningiomas are benign brain tumors located in the meninges, which are the layer between the skull and brain.  I was relieved to find out it was not cancer, however given the location of the tumor, I was very concerned. They told me it was in my frontal lobe located behind my left eye. In the meantime, I had been noticing my vision was getting worse in that eye and I was starting to have some tingling and numbness on the left side of my face. After almost two years of practically begging my pcp and neurologist (at the time) I was finally referred to a neuro-surgeon in 2018. I also want to mention this : Both my pcp and neurologist at that time kept blaming my symptoms on anxiety! I thought I was literally losing my mind. Side note: I no longer have the same neurologist and pcp. 

My neuro-surgeon took one look at my most recent scans and told me if I didn't have surgery soon, I would be paralyzed on my left side and my left eye would close and never open again.  The tumor had gotten so big that it was putting pressure on my carotid artery. I had a craniotomy in November of 2019. The surgery took five and a half hours. I remember coming out of surgery all wrapped up tight and my left eye was completely closed. It took about ten weeks for me to recover and two and a half months to open my eye again. My surgeon was able to remove about 98% of the tumor; the rest of it was wrapped around my oculomotor and optic nerves. I have been living with double vision and a third nerve palsy. This is due to damage to the nerves caused my compression of the tumor during surgery. I do not have full vision in my left eye, the eye is no longer centered, and my field of vision has been compromised. I also have a permanently dilated pupil. However, I can not even express just how grateful I am to my family and friends for their support, and to the wonderful and caring staff of doctors, nurses, and others at Hartford Hospital. It is because of my neuro surgeon and his wonderful team that I am doing so well today. After going through all of this, I went on to fulfill my dream of writing and publishing. I published three books and I still have so much I want to accomplish. I do not take any day for granted and I look at life from a different perspective. It is amazing how losing part of your sight actually makes you see things so much more clearly. I don't know why this happened to me, but I have learned to stop focusing on that so much and just enjoy each day.