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Brain Tumour, Pokemon, & Disconnection

8 years ago2,195 words

I'll be spending next week in hospital, having brain surgery for what may very well be a malignant tumour. I'm genuinely not scared at all. I just feel numb, still because my life's so deeply dissatisfying that I feel I have so little to lose.

I'm writing this on a train, which I'll be on for about five hours. I've spent the majority of my time on trains recently... First going to the hospital, then to visit a friend yesterday, and now to visit another friend today. It's a nice change from the weeks of crushing isolation, though it's frustrating that I have to spend so much time and money just to be hugged.

Perhaps instead of seeing that as a frustration, I should be glad there are people in the world who'll hug me at all.

I wrote in my previous post that the last neurosurgeon I saw hadn't seen my scans, and basically just dismissed me as a hypochondriac... But that he'd changed his mind and I'd have to wait a couple of weeks for an appointment. Perhaps they deemed it more urgent than that, though, and I had an appointment within days.

I liked the neurosurgeon I saw this time. Obviously intelligent like the last one - skinny, bespectacled, big nose, wearing a neat suit, narrow face - but nice and attentive. I'm happy for him to poke around in my mindmeat.

I thought I maybe had a pineal cyst and would need a cut into the back of my head to remove it... But what he'll be doing instead is something called a third ventriculostomy, which involves cutting an substitute cerebral aqueduct to drain the hydrocephalus. It's apparently very safe, though it involves operating near a deeply important artery which, if damaged, spells certain death. Part of me wants to ask him to 'accidentally' cut it. I'm also concerned about the path the endoscope will take; though the third and fourth ventricles are near the base of the brain (and the operation involves opening a channel between the two), the surgeon cuts in through the top. Does that mean he'll cut through the cortex? Will any of 'me' be lost if he does? I don't know.

More of a concern is the strange tissue growth, which he said could be anything from a benign pineal cyst - which they'll just leave as it is - to a long list of tumours, each with their own properties. They'll need to do further tests to find out what it is, and to do a further operation if necessary.

So I may literally have brain cancer.

It's probably bad that I don't even care. Probably.



I saw my friend yesterday. I'd been looking forward to it for ages. She's the 'best friend' I've talked about here before; the person who I spent most of my university life with. We've been in touch over the past few weeks via text, but hadn't met up since the end of May.

She - like apparently the rest of the world - had got very much into Pokemon Go a few days ago, but said that since she never goes out, she had very few Pokemon. I got excited about us playing it together when I saw her, so then she could remedy that deficit with my help and company.

When I met up with her, we were both incredibly anxious (I was much more nervous than I was at any stage of finding out about my brain), and she ran to me with a grin and hugged me tightly. We were happy and jokey for at least the first few minutes, glad to reconnect... I just wish it had stayed that way.

I'd gone to visit her in her hometown, where she's lived all her life... And within the first ten minutes, we'd walked past several people she knew. She didn't say anything other than 'hi' and a wave, but - and I hate that my mind works this way - I just felt jealous... I have no hometown as such; I left my childhood town at age 13ish and the place I spent my teens at age 19ish. I have no local connections here. I can't help but envy that sense of connection, of belonging; of seeing your past and pleasant memories all around you.

We talked a bit about Pokemon Go, and she mentioned how she'd spent twelve hours with it with her boyfriend the day before, collecting loads of Pokemon and having many fun and funny experiences, catching Pokemon on each other's body parts and such. I felt deflated, being reminded - as I often am - not just of how she knows someone she'd do these things first with, and for longer (we were only together for about seven hours), but of how having a partner opens up so many opportunities that this suffocating singleness deprives me of.

She also talked about what 'everyone' was up to in regards to Pokemon Go; how people were all catching loads of Pokemon, empowering them, making silly pictures and videos and jokes and stuff about their experiences that she could relate to and derive pleasure from. All seen on Facebook via her web of connections, of course. I know nothing about what 'everyone' is up to with the game beyond what she told me. My only real experience with it is a couple of long solitary walks. This got to me too; made me aware that I'm so cut off from the world, from other people, missing out on so much.

People say that Facebook is bad, fake, things like that; that people present idealised versions of their lives, cherry-picked or even staged experiences... I've read that it's destructive if you use it to replace a real life, but if you use it to merely augment your real experiences or to keep your finger on the pulse of the world - as she does - it can bolster your experience of life, your feeling on interconnectedness and being a part of something... I'm missing out on that. It pains me so much.

Few people want to be so cut off from their fellow humans. I certainly don't... But it's so hard to remedy, at least with my ridiculous mind.

She also mentioned that she's going to some huge gaming convention with what sounds like multiple people, and she's really excited about it because her YouTube idols will be there and she can meet them. She's also going on holiday for a week after that, to Rome, with her boyfriend. I'm happy for her, having these things to look forward to, these wonderful opportunities... But again, my heart sank through comparison. All I have to look forward to is brain surgery and emptiness. I lack the connections that make these opportunities possible.

Our actual interactions were somewhat awkward. I realised that while I enjoy her company, I have little idea of what to even talk about. She shares stories of what she or other people have been up to, the things in her life... All I have in my life is my problems though, my thoughts. So when I talk about myself, I talk about that. It's draining and difficult to relate to. I know that. But it's all I know.

She said she enjoyed being with me, but I could tell she was uncomfortable, and she didn't exactly beg me not to leave when I had to. I'm too insecure, she needs to reassure me too often. I'm aware of that, and how fulfilling it isn't to be with such a person, but despite my efforts to be nice and cheery and entertaining, the huge weight pushing down on me squeezed many of those insecurities out anyway.

It didn't help that I got two phone calls from the hospital, telling me about an MRI scan on Monday... Bringing that into our time together.

I feel like a disappointment. Conditioned in such a way that dark input produces only dark output. Trapped in a corner from which escape is too difficult.

My mother had a 'friend' when we were in Australia; the mother of one of my brother's acquaintances. She was single, I think, and would invite my mother over to talk with her sometimes... But all she'd do was go on and on about her problems. Her sorrows, fears, pains. The emptiness of it all. Didn't let my mother get a word in. My mother's polite, so she just listened, but she told me in private that she just couldn't stand this woman.

I remember her sometimes, and fear that I've become exactly the same thing. I listen as much as I talk, so I'm not quite as bad, but even so, I feel like I drag people down.

I keep remembering spirituality, however. There's always this urge to grow, to change... To become better than I am by 'fixing' the 'problems' that blacken my inner sky. I remember ideas like how no matter how much your external circumstances change, they bring with them new limitations. Being single means you miss out on things. Being in a relationship means you lose certain freedoms and have certain obligations. Being alone might make you pine for someone; being with someone 'imperfect' might just make you pine for someone different while you feel trapped. I've been in both situations.

I understand the wisdom of that... But my mind argues. Surely starvation and being well-fed aren't equal in their limitations? Surely one is simply, objectively better than the other? Maybe relationships bring issues, yes... As does great wealth. But having something is better than nothing, and having something *good* that you're genuinely pleased with is better still. Though many people may be dissatisfied with their partners, some - like my friend - are happy with them after many years. How could I not want that myself? It seems to enrich life immensely.

And yet it's the mind that decides whether a partner is fulfilling or not. Whether or not you're happy with them. I feel that my own perfectionism might prevent me from being happy with anyone at this stage. I need to tame my mind.

But it's so much easier to wallow in what's wrong.



I decided to travel to see this other friend on a whim, as she's only in the UK temporarily and we won't get to meet again for a long, long time.

But I feel we barely know each other these days... We only met twice, early last year, days apart, and we rarely talk via text. Will our interactions be even more awkward than yesterday's? She has several people she's close to, and stories spent with them make up her life. Will I be reminded again of all I don't have but wish I did?

And yet I feel my mind discounts and ignores what I do have because it seems to want to suffer. Like it enjoys it somehow.

The spiritual teacher person I listen to called this part of us the 'pain body' or ego; a psychological construct of sorts that feeds on the pain of ourselves or others. It grows through sorrow and anger, and tries to provoke those feelings in others so as to gorge itself. I can easily see it in myself and others.

What we should do, he said, is to learn not to indulge it. To recognise it before it can lash out or possess us entirely; to calm it before the storm begins.

I try. I know there's this part of me that gets masochistic pleasure and a sense of identity out of being miserable, but that it's not me, and I know that this awareness dulls its fangs somewhat. I feel it has less control of me than it did in the past.

Still, taming it seems to be an ongoing challenge.



One interesting thing I've been noticing is that I feel completely numb... Like I don't care anymore, about myself or about anything. It's not such a bad thing. While it blocks happiness, it seems to block anxiety too. I felt no stress at all from the trains to and from the hospital or from talking with doctors or nurses once there, either from the brain issue they were taking with me about or the social interaction itself. The nurses seemed surprised by how unworried I was, actually. This despite lifelong intense neuroticism.

I don't feel anything about this trip today, either. I just hope I'm not unpleasant to be around when I get there.

The numbness made me face Facebook; the anxieties of the past were no longer barriers. I felt bad comparing my life with my friend's, but like I needed to change that rather than to just wallow and sulk.

Perhaps I'll use the time lying in a hospital ward to poke at my phone and explore things I normally wouldn't. Already I've contacted people without hesitation whereas before I delayed for hours, consumed by doubts and fears.

Anyway, I'm rambling. It's cathartic to do so. I'll update this thing in the hospital to record how it went.