I managed to be part of the conversation with the doctor though.  It seems the tumour is in the back left side of the brain.  It is in the brain not on it, which I don’t really get the difference, although to me it sounds worse.  But it does mean that Dad isn’t having seizures, they seem to occur when the tumour is pressing on the brain.  The tumour is very large and seems to be growing quickly, so much that the centre of it appears dead because it has used up its supply of nutrients.  The place of the tumour is affecting Dad’s language and comprehension abilities, which was really noticeable today, and probably affecting his sight on the right side. For those of you that don’t know the part of the brain that processes the information from the optical nerves is at the back of your head. 

The doctor explained all this, although it seemed to just freak Dad out a lot and he was relying on Mum.  A decision was made though, that on Wednesday he will have surgery.  The doctor will use an ultra sound device to work away at the tumour and get as much as possible out without damaging the healthy part of Dad’s brain.  This is big surgery, it will take about three hours.  There are risks, risks that the blood vessels might be damaged, risks of infection, and a risk of death.  But unlike what my brother told me on the phone when he said death was a high possibility the doctor said that these risks were about a 10% chance of happening, so although a risk, not as high as I was thinking.  They will then test what they evacuate.  I don’t know how helpful this will be, the doctor says he hopes to make him better and avoid making anything worse.  I don’t know if it will save his life, I don’t know if it will give him back his mental capabilities, but we all know that if we do nothing then this tumour will continue eating away at his brain and he will slowly lose more and more of himself.  He may need radiation therapy but at least that isn’t as hard on the body as chemotherapy. 

Today’s been hard.  It was hard to see Dad like that, it was hard to deal with family dynamics.  When I went out to have a smoke I got angry at Mum’s friend Joyce who was also down.  She expected me to take her up and show her when Dad was, but I just gave her directions and went outside.  Later she made some biting comment about getting lost.  I was barely holding everything together.  Hell when I went outside and someone asked me for a lighter I couldn’t stop crying.  I ended up calling Bob and he sat with me.  I remember waiting for him to come out and desperately trying to work up the courage to ask him to touch me, to stroke my arm, or hold my hand.  It felt so wrong but I knew we needed it.  He came out and sat down beside me and lightly rubbed me across the shoulders.  I was grateful that he did it, and that I didn’t need to ask.