Lobe Yourself

This is quite a personal post this week. I had a really severe panic attack in the middle of the night where I genuinely thought I was dying or about to have a seizure. It started with a headache that wasn't being controlled with any painkiller; including codeine and Amitriptyline. My brain tumour is something that frightens the life out of me anyway so when I can't control a headache I often jump to conclusions.  I realised I was on blood thinning injections that have been known to cause aneurysms in Brain Tumour patients so I basically concluded I was having one of these and was about to start seizing. Commence the rapid heart rate, high blood pressure and shortness of breath. It literally felt like my lungs had disconnected from their affinity for C02 and only my gasps would keep me ticking.  I was genuinely so frightened and it's bizarre to think that this all comes from the thoughts and fears in your head. My headache had already gone by this point and ...

Last weekend, myself and 20 other Young Ambassadors of The Brain Tumour Charity met for the first time. It was both fascinating and emotive being around so many other young people like myself who were so heavily affected by Brain Tumours. Most impressively, it was amazing to experience how motivated we became to make a massive difference in the world of brain tumour research. We all had the chance to share our stories, the amount of variation in these was astounding: every brain tumour story has it's unique differences and certain sets of challenges. We were able to help each other through these thought processes and contribute whatever advice or lessons learnt from experiences that we had had. One of the major issues that almost everyone had a resounding issue with was the communication between the patient and the family and friends. In some cases it felt awkward, in most cases it felt un-equipped and in a few instances patients were left isolated. We felt this really need...

It's been a full year since my diagnosis and if I do say myself, it has actually been overall a good year. Going into this journey, especially with the state of shock not wearing off for a few months, and no sense of expectation for my future...I feel like I've achieved quite a lot in 12 months. Being a very practical person, I remember the first thing I did was sort out my finances and name my LPA's so I didn't have to worry about anything should I have a worst case scenario. I found myself worrying a lot more about living as a 'vegetable' than I did about dying. I'll be the first to admit that this journey isn't the easiest but there have been so many fantastic things that have come out of Year 1. Having this Brain Tumour has opened so many doors for me that I otherwise would never have explored. I truly believe that my quality of life and the quality of my relationships has improved so much because of it. I really live in the moment and enj...

First of all...I would like to apologise for my absence as I have been on bed rest for four weeks feeling quite different on codeine!  About 6 weeks ago I was at a party and intended to slide into the splits but instead my leg impaled the floor before I had the chance to show off my dramatic skillset: this resulted in a traumatic fracture to my knee and a patella dislocation. Ouch! For me this was really bad timing as it was the day before I was due to start my dream role on Harley Street! Luckily, they were really kind about the whole situation and unfortunately six weeks later I'm still on unpaid sick leave...but my job is waiting for me when I get back on my feet. I had reconstructive surgery four weeks ago to repair the damage and in true Chantal fashion: this is genuinely the second time in ten years that I've done this so I'm a bit of a professional now. I have found that I've been going slightly mad not knowing what to do with myself over the...