Jealous: Adjusting After Brain Surgery

JEALOUS

I was certainly glad to be home, but things didn't seem like they had before I left. I had been ''the lady of the house”; I had bought our own groceries; I had taken the responsibility of running my own home. But now things were different! There were two other ladies taking my place! I understood the necessity of having them but..........

There had been so many changes; everything seemed different now.

More and more I was realizing the wide gulf between what I could do and what I no longer would be able to do. I still couldn't read or enjoy TV and not having yet learned to do anything with my left hand I had nothing to do. I mean absolutely nothing! I was so bored and was getting weaker and weaker, first from the operation and over three weeks stay in the hospital, and now, from lack of exercise.

As I sat around the house with nothing to do in those tight, white, support hose with my leg propped up, my mind blank and just staring into space,, I could hear Jack and his new part-time secretary laughing and talking with each other in his office and sounding like they were having such a good time. As the days went by, I continued to hear them, day in and day out, talking and laughing while they worked together. I wanted so badly to be able to ta1k....... and laugh. It seemed that without speech I had lost contact with the outside world.

Back in my bedroom, by myself, I felt so lonesome and alone.

I began experiencing that same ''excluded'' feeling. I felt..........

.............jealous, I reckon. I had never been a jealous person before, and I didn’t want to be jealous now. But I guess I was ........... jealous of them having such a good time together. Jealous of anybody able to talk and laugh and feel like having fun. I certainly was no fun! Nor was I young.......... or good looking. I was bald headed and had a big scar left from the incision. I couldn't think or talk or comprehend well enough to even follow a conversation, and I didn't feel good......... and I looked even worse. I would cry at the drop of a hat; in fact, there was just a fine line between my crying and my not crying. And I hated myself for feeling jealous.

I wrestled with my guilt; I didn't understand my feeling myself. I should have been happy that they could enjoy one another. That's what Jack would have said to me. But I was not happy. I felt isolated, afraid and alone. With not being able to communicate with others and not able to express my hurts, I found myself in a lonesome little world..................a1l by myself.

Household Help after Brain Surgery

Myrtle was to literally be ''my right arm”. She was more than just a maid, as evidenced in time, by the many extra kindnesses she did for me and the family. She met me at the ear to help me get out and then, while Jack was parking the car in the garage, she slowly led me up the front walk and on through the front door. I was still very weak and the trip from Columbia had exhausted me, but it was so very good to be home again! Myrtle had turned the cover back on my bed so it would look inviting and I, being tired, headed straight for it. She and I would soon become very good Christian friends.

Jack was to be responsible for lining up nurses to administer the Heparin injection in my stomach in hopes that the clot in my leg would soon be dissolved. I was so glad now, that I had drawn the floor plan with Jack's office in our house; it made it much easier for him to see that I was taken care of. Between the secretary from nine to twelve and the maid from twelve to four and Jack in the evenings, I would have somebody in the house with me most all the time to answer the telephone and the door.

SO MANY CHANGES

I remember humming to the radio as Jack drove me home to Orangeburg. I hadn't used my vocal chords in such a long time I was afraid they might not work anymore. So I was relieved to find that I could still carry a tune even though I couldn't sing any words. I had sung in our church choir ever since our church began in 1956 and music had always been such an enjoyable part of my life. I wouldn't be able to play the piano anymore so I clung to the hope that I might still be able to sing.

So much had happened me in the past three weeks-.....so many changes for my life......so many things I would no longer be able to do. As are drove along I learned from Jack that he had hired a part-time secretary who was to work from nine in the morning until twelve noon to help him in his office in our new house. I remembered now having heard Jack talking to Eleanor about somebody being young and good-looking but I had not understood what they were talking about so I hadn't made any connection.

Jack told me also, that he had hired a maid, to work from noon to four o'clock in the afternoon, to take care of me, to do the bookings to buy the groceries and run the house since I could no longer do these things. (So that's what Eleanor and Jack were talking about at the foot of my hospital bed when I overheard .....secretary ..............maid!)

DISCHARGED after Meningioma Surgery

I became so bored, and so lonesome....just lying there hour after hour........day in and day out. Some visitor, other than family, would come every now and then, but not being able to converse, the conversation still had to be all one-way. I found out that Harry A., from Orangeburg, was in the hospital room right next to mine, but there was no question about going over to visit him; I had to stay in bed with my leg propped up in those tight, white, support hose!

At last, after three weeks and two days, on March 15, 1983, I was told I could go HOME..........but with the understanding that I would keep my leg propped up and would continue wearing the tight, white, support hose. And that Jack would be responsible for lining up nurses to give me the Heparin injections.

THE DISCHARGE SUMMARY from the Richland Memorial Hospital read:
PATIENT: Ashlyn Gray
She underwent a craniotomy.....with the removal of meningioma.
Tumor had invaded most of the skull on the left side. Craniectomy was required to remove all of this bone involved with tumor. Also the dura was sacrificed. ....she developed thrombophlebitis and was seen by Dr. Love who began the patient on Heparin....improved to the point that she could ambulate with minimal assistance with most of the deficit being in the arm and in speech.
CONDITION: Improved
PROGNOSIS: Good

Getting Better, Then a Setback

Finally, the bulky dressing was cut off of my bald head and the drain tube and the sack were both removed. In its place I was given a soft little skull cap like the one I has been given with the first brain tumor. Now I could hear better and it would be much easier to move about, to get up to sit in the chair, and to go to the bathroom, all without having to hold the sack. By this time I was able to walk almost normally.

Several times Avery H. came to visit. He would help get me in a wheelchair, roll me down the hall, down the elevator, to the front door and on out to the fresh air, green grass, and well people. Those outings were delightful and meant so much to me. I was getting better and better all the time!

But, then, I developed thrombophlebitis (a clot) in my left leg.
I would no longer be able to move around freely but would, now be confined to the hospital bed.....and my stay in the hospital would be prolonged! I was started on Heparin and had to keep a pillow under my knee and wear some tight, white, support hose.

My Friends with Brain Tumors are Now Dead

Bill D. from Columbia came visit one day and told me he had given a blood replacement in my name. What a nice thing to do!

(He has died now from an inoperable brain tumor. And Claude H., also, who was one of our former ministers and such a wonderful person! Most people who have brain tumors seem to die…..I have a hang up with feelings of guilt when it comes to this subject. I ask myself, ''Why this wonderful man? Why this wonderful, young minister? Why not me? Why am I still here's at is certainly hard to understand. God knows.)

Speech test "METHODIST-EPISCOPAL"

One day Dr. Paysinger, when making his post-operative rounds at the hospital, came in my room and asked me if I could say ''Methodist-Episcopal''. I, being a Methodist and not able to hear very well with the bulky dressing over my ears, couldn't: figure out what he was saying. Being unable to ask, I thought maybe he was just joking around with me. I tried to cover up my bewilderment by kind of laughing, but was not really understanding why he was saying anything about my being a Methodist....... or, for that matter, why he was saying anything about Episcopal.

Then several days later he came in my room again and asked if I could say ''Methodist-Episcopal'' yet. I, knowing he knew full well I couldn't say it, thought he was just teasing me again. So once again I tried to cover up by kind of laughing and just smiling as if I knew what was going on.
Months later I learned from Eleanor much to my embarrassment and chagrin, that ''Methodist-Episcopal is a test used to check a patient s ability to speak. So that was why Dr. Paysinger kept asking me if I could say it! I felt so foolish then, the way I had responded to Dr. Paysinger. I reckon if you can speak well enough to say ''Methodist-Episcopal'' you can say about anything.