
Back in 2007 I had a brain tumour, it was a Hemangioblastoma. It's a rare non cancerous tumour that occurs in about 2 to 3 people per million per year. It was supposed to be a fairly simple operation. Hemangioblastoma's are slow growing, and the tumour was 'away from all the major clockwork'.
Unfortunately MRI scans had failed to portray how “entangled” the tumour had become in hundreds of blood vessels.
Any of the blood vessels could be an essential supply to the brain stem. Each one the surgeon cut was likely to starve a part of the brain of oxygen, so he knew he was going to cause damage, but it was near-impossible to predict to what extent. I’m now forty one, I was twenty four when I had my brain tumour removed. I'm in a wheelchair, have Ataxia and have double vision and speech problems.
I've written a book; Brain Tumours, John Bonham and Fat Pigeons. It’s a cautionary tale, but also one of hope. I feel very fortunate to be able to share my story, and who knows it may help somebody going through similar times. It may help somebody identify the problem instead of making the same mistakes I did.
Plus, you want to know why fat pigeons are mentioned, don't you...
I wanted to make a hardback version so I could have lots of pictures in, but it would cost a lot. So I put them on social media. You can follow me in Instagram and Facebook
www.instagram.com/fatpigeonsbook
www.facebook.com/fatpigeonsbook
www.youtube.com/@fatpigeonsbook
There is an article on the Brain Tumour Research Website - braintumourresearch.org
An article in The Sentinel
An article on BBC News
Several times throughout the book I refer to funny stories from my younger pre brain tumour days. This is a short video I made with my friend Helen Lawson narrating it.