Hi, my name is Lydia, I am 31 years old and a mother of 3 great kids. I was dignosed with Acoustic Neuroma when I was 21 and when they found it, I had it removed the following week. The tumor was very large and the doctor said if I didn't have it removed then, I would have died within the next year. When I heard this, I was in shock, I couldn't talk or function right, I didn't know what to do, I had just had my first baby the year before and I didn't want to leave him and my whole family was in total shock along with me, I had the surgery, I was in the hospital for a week and off of work for 2 months. The doctor said it would take up to 18 months before any function in the face would come back. The surgery was in May and that October, I had to have another surgery to put in a disk in my ear canal due to the first surgery they took out the bone behind the ear to get the tumor out and it caused my ear to go deaf. And at this time, I was so hoping I would be done and just do the wait and watch game. Well I did just that and went to the doctor after the wait period and no function had come back. So they sent me for another MRI and to find out when they did the first surgery, it started to come back. Talk about a real shock to the system I'm telling ya. I couldn't stop crying and I had my mom sick at the time as well. So I had it done again. People say to me they don't know how I did it. And honestly, I ask myself that same question, I had a special person in my life that made me fight to stay with him, and that's my son Michael. He gave me the courage to fight this and till this very day I am still fighting this because there is still no change in my face and am hoping one of these days I will start to feel better and not look at myself in the mirror. I hope to hear from somebody out here who knows what I am going thru and I can talk to.
