Written by Melissa Lambert

It was April 26th 2021, and I was on my way to a physical therapy appointment.  I had been struggling the last few months because I had migraines, bouts of vomiting, and extreme lethargy.  It was a struggle to clean my house, perform normal acts, or to even stay awake most of the time.  I was on my way to a physical therapy appointment because my neck and back caused severe pain, so I wanted to finish these appointments to get to the source of why I was in so much pain.  I was almost always late since getting up and around took a lot of effort for me.  At 9:30 am, I hit the car in front of me in a small fender bender.  This fender bender ended up saving my life.  Let me explain why.

The police officer that came for the fender bender was very nice and polite, however, he had lost his mind!  He let me know that he thought I was drunk, and this is why I just got into an accident.  Drunk!  I didn’t even drink alcohol, much less in the morning, much less at 9:30 am in the morning, thank you very much!  The police officer was insistent.  He made me complete a field sobriety test.  I had to get out of my car and place one foot in front of the other while touching my finger to my nose and saying the alphabet frontwards and backwards.  Being clumsy by nature, it’s hard for me to do any of these things, much less all these things at the same time.   After failing this test, the police officer requested I call my husband to come get me.  I did this, then handed the phone to the police officer.  I told my husband, Ray, to explain to him that I don’t drink alcohol, and that there is no way that I was drunk.  The officer talked with my husband, and I decided to take a nap as I waited for him to come get me. 

What I didn’t hear was this officer telling my husband that if I wasn’t drunk, there may be a medical reason for me to be so out of it.  He suggested we go to the hospital to get checked out.  This is exactly what my husband did, especially after finding me slumped over the steering wheel of my car.  We immediately went to St. Vincent’s Emergency Room in Sherwood Arkansas for an evaluation.  Ray let the people know, I was just in an accident, that I had been sick and lethargic, and that I needed a full scan to see what was going on to cause all of this.  They completed a Positron Emission Tomography (PET) scan and this is when they found a massive brain tumor, covering almost the entire left side of my brain.  I remember Ray waking me up so the nurse could tell me the results.  The male nurse was more in shock than I was about the whole situation.  He said, “ma’am, you have a brain tumor”, to which my response was “No way, I do not have a brain tumor”.  Then he looked at me again and said, “No, Ma’am, you have a Braaaainnnnn Tuuummmoooorrrrrrr”.  This is when he showed us the scans of my brain.  This was when my whole world changed forever.  I had just turned 40 years old.  There was no reason for PET scans.  No reason to suspect any kind of medical issues.  No reason to investigate any health concerns at all.  Yet, if I had not been in a fender bender that day, I would have lost my life.  The doctor confirmed this to us, telling me that if I would have waited one more month, I wouldn’t have made it in to see him. 

On April 28, 2021, I had my first craniotomy.  I had to stay in the hospital after the tumor was discovered.  This caused me to miss my son’s tenth birthday.  I don’t remember much after the surgery, only that I was able to stay for a few days to recover before I was sent home.  The doctors sent the cultures to a lab to see what kind of tumor it was.  The normal labs could not determine what it was, so they had to send it to a specialist in Chicago.  Their final determination was I had a Stage III Anaplastic Ependymoma. 

I learned that tumors do not have the benign, or malignant classification.  They are classified in stages.  I and II stages are considered more “benign” and the possibility of them coming back were very rare.   Stages III and IV are more “malignant”, meaning more aggressive in nature with the possibility of recurrences.  Ependymomas’ normally occur in children, toward the base of their heads, near the spine.  They usually wrap around the spinal cord.  Mine just so happens to be very rare, first because I am an adult, and secondly because mine appeared in my prefrontal cortex, in the front part of my brain.  Apparently only 200 people in our nation have this kind of brain tumor.  Ependymomas’ are also known to be recurring. 

After my craniotomy, I had to complete 33 rounds of targeted radiation.  I lost the left side of my hair completely, while the right side was still full of hair.  I opted out of using wigs.  Instead, I used wraps around the front of my head and pushed the hair I had left on my right side to the left to cover the rest of the baldness in the back.  Losing my hair was really hard.  As a woman, you don’t fully understand how significant your hair is until you don’t have it anymore.  I purposely chose to wait to even my hair out until the left side grew back in.  As I waited, the right side of my hair, which was almost down to my hip, became brittle at the ends and would break off.  By the time I evened everything out, the right side was almost as short as the left.  At this point, all my MRIs every 3 months were coming back clear.  No new spots or lesions came until April 18th of 2023.  This MRI showed a new growth, and I had to schedule another craniotomy. 

I must pause here to tell you why I remember these dates so clearly.  In 2017, my husband Ray found out he had a brain tumor.  It was a stage II Neurocytoma.  This means his tumor was in the left ventricle of his brain, and since it was stage II tumor, it is less likely to come back.  His brain scans showed a very small pea sized spot in that area of his brain.  His surgeon wanted to do surgery immediately, but my husband did not.  He wanted to wait to see if this tumor grew anymore before he had the surgery.  Every year, he would go and get an MRI and they did not show any growth in the size of his tumor, so he would put off having surgery.  By the time I had my first surgery in 2021, I had completely forgotten about him having a tumor as well because for the last three and a half years we never discussed any new growth.  At the end of 2022, as Ray went in for his MRI, this scan showed a significant amount of growth.  The tumor now covered his entire left ventricle.  It was also starting to show effects of this growth on his health.  He started having major migraines, blurred vision, and his right arm began to shake.  We decided to schedule a craniotomy for him as soon as possible.

On February 9th of 2023, Ray had his brain tumor removed.  It was a very long surgery that started around 7:00am and lasted almost 8 hours.  The next day the physical therapist wanted to get him up and walking. This is when we realized the right side of his body was completely immobile.  He could only move his toes and his fingertips.  He could not get himself up, lift his right arm, or push with his right leg.  This was a very scary time for me because I did not know what the future held for us both.  He stayed in the hospital for 5 days, then on February 14th of 2023, he was transferred to rehabilitation.  We had to “wake up” the connection in his brain to his right side before he could come home.  When Ray realized that he could not come home yet, and that he had to go to rehabilitation, he realized how significant his situation was.  He worked hard every day with physical therapy, occupational therapy and speech therapy, just so he could go back home.  The weekend was the worst for him.  He became desperate to get back home and doubled his efforts to do so. Finally, after 10 days of rehab, on February 24th Ray was able to get himself out of bed, walk by himself, shower alone, and come home. 

It took Ray two months to fully recover enough to go back to work.  I had to care for our children and their schedules, as I helped care for him.  He was supposed to go to outpatient physical therapy; however, at our initial appointment the doctors determined Ray had passed all of his skills tests, so he did not qualify for outpatient therapy.  Ray’s first day back to work was on April 18th, 2023.  I remember it so clearly because this was the day I had to go get another MRI.  We discussed him taking that day off to be with me, but I told him this wasn’t a big deal.  All my other MRIs had come back clear so there was no need for him to be there.  On his first day back to work I had to let him know they had found another spot on my brain, and I had to do another craniotomy.  It was scheduled for May 4th of 2023. 

I was much more aware of what was happening during this second surgery.  They had to go through the first incision, so for me it was much more painful.  I remember waking up in extreme pain and staying in pain for almost an entire month, but after just taking care of Ray with his surgery, I was extremely motivated to get back up and keep moving!   I had to complete another five rounds of radiation after this surgery.  This time the radiation was more powerful.  It is called Hypo fractionated Radiation, or External Beam Radiation Therapy (EBRT). Because of how powerful EBRT is, my sessions were every other day.   The next few MRIs came back clear, until December 4, 2023.  They confirmed another spot, this time in a new location, my temporal lobe.  The new radiation caused the Ependymoma to fracture into a different location.  My third craniotomy was on January 18, 2024, followed by another 5 rounds of EBRT. This time they added chemotherapy, Temodar because of the tumor moving into a new location of my brain.  I started Temodar on April 11th, and I will finish it in April of 2025.  My last MRI showed two new spots that were very small.  They are 95% sure that one round of EBRT will make these new spots disappear.  I will find out for sure February 19, 2025. 

Through all of this, every surgery, every round of radiation, every dose of chemo, what gives me hope to endure?  I think for every situation we face in life, keeping the right perspective is key to overcoming any of life’s obstacles.  I face each new day with a choice, and I chose to look through the eyes of faith.    It tells me each new day is a gift because it is an extension of my life.  I could have died without ever knowing I had a brain tumor, yet it was found, and I am still alive.  Every day after April 26 2021 is a new chance for me to be everything I have always wanted to be, and I refuse to let Anaplastic Ependymomas define who I am.  Since my first surgery, I have made the most of every day I have been given.  I volunteer for a food bank in my community.  I am on the PTOs at my children’s schools.  I lead Step Studies at my local Celebrate Recovery group, and I went back to school for a Master’s in Special Needs Education.  I may not have all the answers, but each day I chose to keep looking through the eyes of faith that tell me whatever comes my way, we will be okay.  We have enduring faith that continues to help us overcome life’s obstacles. My hope is that our story inspires you to have enduring faith as well!