My Clothes Don't Fit Me No More

Well, tomorrow (Monday, November 19) is the day that I am going to have my surgery.  I am going to have a bilateral anterior capsulotomy by Magnetic Resonance-guided Focused Ultrasound Surgery (MRgFUS) to treat the depression that I have been living with for years.  They won't have to cut me open, although there will be four small openings made in my skin where they bolt the frame that they use to my skull.  They will be making lesions in my brain using high-frequency ultrasound waves that are focused at a particular part of my brain.  The entire surgery will take place inside of an MRI machine.  I will be inside the machine for about four hours as they perform the operation.  The frame that is bolted to my head will fit inside a special helmet that contains one thousand transducers that convert electricity to ultrasound waves.  The neurosurgeon will be in the next room controlling everything via computer.

I have had all of my baseline testing and screening done.  This operation is part of a Phase I clinical trial, so they have to do lots of testing both before and after the operation to see if anything untoward occurs and to measure my progress.  Nothing turned up in the screening tests, so I guess we have a green light to go for the operation tomorrow.

I had to get my wife, Laila, to shave my head today.  They wanted my head shaved and even with it shaved, the neurosurgeon, Dr. Lipsman, will shave it closer before the operation tomorrow.  They want a very close shave with all of the hair removed.  Here is how I look with my head shaved.

I have to be there very early in the morning tomorrow and by this time tomorrow I should be all done.  It would be great if I suddenly got better after having the operation performed, however, that is not to be expected.  They say that it can take three months to a year before I notice any difference.  That is a long time to wait for something to happen.

I am getting very anxious and worried.  This is brain surgery.  Anything could go wrong.  The consent that I signed said that there was the possibility of serious neurological deficits, even death.  They don't expect either to occur, of course, and they haven't seen any negative reactions yet.  However, it is still experimental brain surgery.

I need to do something though.  The years of living with depression have taken a toll on me.  I'm not the same person that I used to be.  Living with this severe depression is incredibly difficult.  I've tried everything else and I don't have many other options left.  This is my last hope.  If this doesn't work, I don't know what I am going to do.

All I can do is hope and pray that everything will work out.