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It’s that time of year. It’s National Brain Tumor Awareness Day!

I haven’t blogged in a while. I’ve been busy creating a Transformational Coaching business; please check that out if you have the opportunity, lifecoaching-matters.com. Life Coaching Matters is for all those who are going or have recently gone through some kind of major life transition…most of us know what that’s about. My becoming an accredited life coach was greatly influenced by not only all my own life experiences over these last twenty plus years, but all the people I’ve met along my long and winding medical road up until this point in my life.  It’s while I continue along this path that I think about #GOGRAYINMAY, it’s while I’m on this path that I think about #BrainTumorThursday. If you’ve just stepped onto your own “medical path” it may surely feel like there isn’t enough that is going on in the world of Brain Cancer; I too want there to  be more, so much more. I want it not to hold that same feeling of confusion when your doctor gives you the news. I want it to be that it doesn’t seem that you both seem to be learning as you move along your stream of treatment. I do know this. I know that in the over twenty years that I’ve been following brain tumors, brain surgery, brain tumor treatment and brain cancer…that things have improved. The way in which we can locate treatment has improved. When I was first diagnosed there was no internet, the only way to research things was in medical libraries, which the average person didn’t have access to, now you can locate information, doctors and find out about both anywhere in the world. You can also find out about experimentation for your specific tumor anywhere in the world. You can receive other opinions from other doctors when your hometown doctor may not know all there is to know about your  rare tumor. This is amazing, and life saving for many.  Also while the advancement in treatment may be frustrating, the advancement in surgery has leaped forward. This is an important component towards treatment and proper diagnosis. When I had my first surgery, there was no real way to get to my tumor, although a surgery was done to try and obtain a biopsy and there was quite a bit of damage that resulted. The good thing is I did have a good surgeon, so what was not good could have been oh much worse. I had a more recent surgery for the same tumor and it was approached a completely different way…a much more direct way. The way the doctor went in the second time wasn’t even imagined back when I had my first surgery. As of today, I’m reading about drug trials that are being used, brain cancer vaccines using the patient’s own tumor cells, and just recently a modified polio virus vaccine. Time changes things. Money changes things. Money makes things change faster. #GOGRAYINMAY!!!  Happy Spring!  I’d love to hear your thoughts, questions, or comments.

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