Catching Up

Hello. My apologies for the long break between posts, particularly when that break included the six-week check-up with the surgeon I was so eagerly anticipating.

I've run into a couple of people recently who've suggested that I'd grown "tired" of keeping up the blog, and I'd like to clarify that this is not the case. To the contrary, I rather enjoy writing, and I imagine I'll keep posting random pictures -- like this one of Maci exacting her revenge on an effigy of convicted dog-fighter Michael Vick -- for a long, long time.

So why the absence? It turns out my six-week check-up stirred up a number of emotions that needed sorting out. But I'll get to that in a bit. First, the medical updates:

June 20th: Lauren and I finally got our audience with our surgeon to see how things were progressing. At this point, I'd stopped taking pain meds, but still didn't feel like "myself." The nurse and surgeon were kind enough to keep things simple for me. In short, my recovery was progressing perfectly, but it will be a full year before the cloud lifts and everything feels like it once did. In the meantime, the following time-table was provided.

Starting immediately, I could walk.

Apparently, the medical profession does not hold the cleanliness of New Jersey's ocean in the highest of regards. To avoid infection, we had to wait a couple more weeks until the incision scar was completely healed before I could swim.

No lifting or anaerobic activity for eight more weeks. That meant none of this for the first summer in a long while.

• No activity that could result in a blow to the head for six months. So this was out as well.
  

Most importantly, I was cleared to start the process of ridding myself of these seizure meds. The surgeon was certain that 1,000 mgs a day of high-powered anti-seizure medications were likely the cause of my daily fog, but they're not something you can quit cold turkey. Instead, I had to pass an EEG to prove that I had no seizure activity, then go through a two-week weaning process.

Lastly, because the surgical clipping process is so "permanent," no diagnostic follow-up would be necessary for 5 years. Essentially, I was a free man. More on this later.

June 20th, afternoon: Lauren and I go for my first walk on the beach. Just weeks removed from my father having to hold my arm while I took shuffling steps around the backyard, it felt rather liberating to be moving under my own power.

June 26th: Took and passed my EEG. Now I just needed the OK from the surgeon to start weaning off the meds.

June 27th: I slowly started to re-introduce sections of running into my walks. My head handled it well, my body...not so much.

July 3rd: Got the thumbs up from the surgeon to back off the meds. A couple more weeks and for the first time in months I'd be able to drink a couple of beers and drive a car, though preferably not at the same time.

July 4th: The prior week had seen some great gains in my overall strength. As a result, on the holiday I declared my independence from Lauren's tyrannical reluctance to admitting my scar was fully healed, and went for my first swim in the bay. If I continued to wait for Lauren's approval, it may well have been 2014 before I was allowed in the water.

July 5th: I tried to take Maci -- resplendent in her new Ruff Wear life vest -- into the bay to join me on a half-mile swim. Bad idea. Not because she couldn't handle it; to the contrary, the sad reality is that my dog is actually a stronger swimmer than I am at this point. And since she insists on climbing on top of me whenever we're in water together (some sort of rescue response, I'm told), about halfway through the swim the experience got significantly less enjoyable. Here's Maci, hawking me from behind.

July 7th: Funny thing about the human body. It's taken me just nine weeks to make great strides in recovering from brain surgery, yet it's been over two years since I could run on the road without pain due to a minor soft tissue injury in my knee. Go figure. But if there's been one silver lining in the six weeks I spent on the couch, it's that my knee has gotten some much needed rest. To test its recovery, Lauren coerced me into joining her for a road run. The knee held up wonderfully, but even better was the chance to run side by side with my wife, who started running shortly after my surgery for the first time in years. For me: my favorite moment in the recovery process. For Lauren: a chance to crush me with her enhanced fitness and taunt me mercilessly as I finished well behind her.

And that pretty much takes us to today. I'm back working, and trying to get in a run or swim every day. More importantly, I'm ready to move on.

And that, more than anything, is why I've stopped updating the blog. To be able to process hearing a surgeon tell us three weeks ago that everything is fine and I can return to a normal life, after everything we've been through, takes an element of faith. Faith that this was the end of something, rather than the beginning.

And in my mind, in order to procure that faith, I need to look forward rather than back. I need to accept this aneurysm for what it was: a medical condition that, while terrifying and potentially life-threatening, has been properly treated. Only then can I stop defining myself by what I've been through, and start living again like I did four months ago: excited for every day to come rather than apprehensive of what may go wrong.

It won't be easy for me, but I know it can be done. Soon, maybe sooner than I realize, a day will come when no one will ask me how I'm feeling. And I look forward to that day more than you can imagine. I've spent three months as the glutton of sympathy, and while I appreciate greatly everyone's concerns, it is not a role I embrace.

So please, if you've been reading this site throughout this process, know that I am eternally grateful for your positive thoughts and prayers. I needed them more than you will ever know. Feel free to stop back, but don't expect to hear about the aneurysm or the recovery process. Trust me, I have a full apprecation for the miracle that's occurred, for just how lucky I am to be alive, let alone to have the opportunity to return to my pre-operative state, to feel closer with my friends, my family, my wife...but again, it's time to move on. I want to think significantly less about the prior few months, and more about the good times that await. More friends, a family of my own, and watching Maci do silly things like fall asleep with her nose through my visor.

So if that sort of thing interests you, by all means, stop on back. In the meantime, I've always wanted an excuse to end something I write with quasi-cheesy song lyrics, and this seems to be as good a time as any. These seem particularly apropos, and they come courtesy of one of my favorite song writers, Roger Clyne:

"While the moon wanes and waxes, surely death and taxes, are lurking out there.

Life is grand, love is real, beauty is everywhere."