active parts of the tumour had been removed from my brain. I was surprised to be in little pain after the operation but as I was heavily sedated, I don’t remember much of what happened over the days that followed. My vision and memory were poor but that was to be expected.
Within a few days, I was back at home and undergoing a six-week course of radiotherapy and chemotherapy. I then had a further six-month course of chemotherapy tablets which made me extremely tired but overall it wasn’t too taxing. What bothered me was the two-stone weight gain from the Epilin medication. A friend of ours recommended the ketogenic diet to me as her mum, who also had a brain tumour, found it worked for her. I gave it a go and as the weight steadily fell off, my vision improved, I gradually felt better within myself and learned to manage my short-term memory problems.
I had a brief scare when the chemotherapy ended as the results from my first check-up scan suggested the tumour was growing again. Thankfully it was false progression and there have been no more scares since.
Of course, there are parts of my old life I miss. In particular my dog agility, when I had competed at Crufts and Olympia with my wonderful little collie Wiz. Now I am just very grateful at being able to remember and run a simple course – but what the heck we still both enjoy it! There is still so much that I can do and that’s what I choose to concentrate on. I now get to babysit my grandson, James, who I thought I would never meet, and that to me that is just so special.
I’ve been travelling – to see Luke complete a triathlon in Copenhagen and to see my friends in Spain – and I’m going to climb Blencathra in the Lake District to fundraise. The mountain has always loomed over our little holiday cottage and I can’t wait to look at it and say I have overcome it. Fifteen of our friends from the dog agility community are joining us and we’ve raised over £3,000 for the Brain Tumour Research charity so far.
I’ve been walking the dogs and helping out at work to keep myself busy, and I’ve even applied for my driving licence to be reinstated but, in the meantime, driving the lawn mower will have to do!
You would think that a brain tumour diagnosis would have completely turned my life upside down, but I’m so fortunate to be able to say that it hasn’t. Although I can’t do everything that I used to, I’ve ‘learned to dance in the rain rather than wait for the storm to pass’ and not even a brain tumour can spoil things for me now.
Jenny Lambert
June 2018
Brain tumours are indiscriminate; they can affect anyone at any age. What’s more, they kill more children and adults under the age of 40 than any other cancer... yet just 1% of the national spend on cancer research has been allocated to this devastating disease.
Brain Tumour Research is determined to change this.
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