Below are pictures of people and places that were part of my “Crack Me Open: The Perks of Having a Brain Tumor and Detached Retina at the Same Time” adventure.
Me at Cable Beach in the Bahamas. To the right of Jai Ang, a woman from Singapore who was also working there, is the spot on the beach where I encountered the Thug Wave.
My Bahamian friend Shaniqua, who helped take care of me after the accident in the ocean, and then hilariously compared the break-up between my brain tumor and my brain to a break-up of a relationship I had with a guy I had met in Nassau.
The relationship in question was with Howard Yee-Keow, a Chinese-Jamaican mechanic from Nassau, the Bahamas, who claimed that the written spelling of his last name varied according to who would be reading it.
Cable Beach Boulevard, the street I walked across with bits of flesh hanging from my legs after the accident in the Bahamas, on my way back to my apartment, located about 1/4 mile down the street on the left.
Outside my apartment on Cable Beach Boulevard in Nassau, the Bahamas, with my neighor LuLu in 2008. I climbed up a circular wrought-iron stair case (not visible in picture) with blood sloshing in my flip-flops after I got back from the accident, and then went into shock when I got inside and sat down, thinking all I might need was a Band-Aid.
Dr. Srikanth Garikaparthi, far left, the surgeon who spent an entire night doing reconstructive surgery on my arms and legs, reattaching my skin that had burst open when I got thrown up against a wall of rocks in the Bahamas on April 12, 2008. While he was sewing leg skin back into place, he had to stand between my legs, and he asked me not to kick him, just to make me laugh.
Dr. J. M. Whitaker, the orthopedic surgeon in Doylestown, Pennsylvania, who removed the bone fragment from my knee that had broken off during my accident in The Bahamas and remained lodged there for a year until it got dislodged while I was practicing yoga.
The Albuquerque Journal newsroom, where I began working in 2013. My desk is at front right, part of the City desk, where I covered Social Services for six months before going to the Features department.
Me at my desk in the Features department of the Albuquerque Journal, where I worked after spending my first six months on the City desk. I would depart from working there in 2015, due to headaches that I'd find out two years later were related to my brain tumor.
The first MRI that I saw of my brain tumor, on March 27, 2017, the day I was diagnosed. This is a photo of one of the scans. It was actually located on the right side of my brain, not left as it appears here.
This is an image of what I would refer to as "brain sauce" at the top right side of the scan, consisting of liquids and gases left behind after the tumor was removed, which felt like a giant blister on my scalp when I pressed down. The substance eventually got reabsorbed into my brain.
A picture of my brain after the tumor was removed. It was taken while I was still in the hospital, after the surgery, the day before I was discarched in May, 2017.
Me and my friend Yahya, originally from Palestine, who got stabbed and died in my car on the way to the hospital in Santa Fe on October 30, 2012, and then came back to life a few minutes later. I was with him when I noticed that I was having trouble seeing out of my left eye, the main symptom of having a detached retina.
Me with my friend Christy, my study partner at Central New Mexico Community College (background) who took me to my retina reattachment surgery on May 8, 2017.
Me (far left) with my friend Stephanie (far right) and two other friends in Prospect Park in Brooklyn, NY in the early 90's. She and I were roommates in Manhattan in 1986, and remained friends ever since. I told Stephanie that perhaps I could have surgery for the brain tumor and detached retina at the same time if they spun me like a rotisserie, and her laughter at that thought cheered me up.
What my scalp looked like immediately after surgery. One of the surgical techs cut my hair off in a horseshoe shape without letting me know ahead of time. The bald exposed scalp is the line along which the neurosurgeon cut my head open to take the tumor out of the meninges of my brain.
My friend Dawn and I in New Jersey in 2009. When I decided that pending surgeries for both a detached retina and a brain tumor was no reason to miss out on a job interview in Buffalo, NY, for a college teaching job in Singapore, Dawn drove from Detroit to Buffalo to meet me at the hotel and help me get ready for the two-day interview.
This image is of my right retina, which was normal, as seen after dialation drops were put into my eye and I leaned my face into a special imagining machine. The image was taken by my favorite tech, Trish, at the University of New Mexico Eye Clinic.
This image was taken during the same appointment, of my left eye when the retina was detached. When I asked for print-outs of the images and noticed the obvious differences, I asked Trish, the tech, what was going on, and she quickly told me that the doctor would let me know, and then she hurried me into the waiting area.
Dr. Joaquin Tosi, my extremely nice and caring retina surgeon, standing next to a piece of artwork I donated to the University of New Mexico Eye Clinic, since patients cannot give gifts directly to any one employee of the clinic. On the other side of that blue wall, he comforted me when I started crying after he told me that the laser surgery intended to pre-empt the need for a formal retina re-attachment surgery had failed.
Dark oversized sunglasses given to me for use to combat light sensitivity. I had to wear them whenever I got my eyes dialated during exams at University of New Mexico Eye Clinic.
My two cats, Shazam, left, and Mr. Crispy, right. In the weeks after brain surgery, whenever I bent down to fill their bowls, I could feel the swishing inside my brain of the liquids trapped there immediately after brain surgery.
Lovelace Medical Center, in downtown Albuquerque, NM, where I got my brain tumor removed, and then spent two nights, the first on the ninth floor in the ICU and the second night in the PCU, before my early discharge.
My friend Jennifer, in the pink shirt, who talked on the phone with me for hours whenever I called her, advising me on how to handle the restraining order application that my brain surgeon filed against me. When I told her about "brain sauce," she said, "La la la! I can't hear you!"
My back yard on Mesa Drive, which I rented out to trailer-dwellers to make extra money when I could no longer work because of the brain tumor. One guest brought me a power pouch of rocks from the Hopi pueblo designed for healing, which I rested on my head to help with the post-surgical pain.
Me with Mama Nkazi at a graduation party in 2013. She and her grand-daughters came over to help me clean my house while I was recovering from back-to-back eye and brain surgeries in 2017.
Me in 2013, while I 'd had the brain tumor for about five years without knowing it, with my dogs, Skipper and Noodle. After taking Skipper to get a haircut, shortly after my first two surgeries, and, still very forgetful, I left my purse at the groomer's.
Dr. Robert Avery, my cataract surgeon with the University of New Mexico Eye Clinic. He told me that replacing a cataract involved inserting a replacement lens that was rolled up like a burrito, and then unrolling it once he got it inside of my eye using special instruments.
My hair beginning to grow back where it had been cut so that there'd be clean scalp for my brain surgeon to slice into. My eye is still somewhat swollen post retina and cataract surgeries.
My friend Lesley, a classmate from Wesleyan University; we both graduated in the 1980's. When I was having a hard time getting my brain in gear after the surgery, she tried to coach me through a job audition to write for an online website. No matter what she tried, I was unable to do it, because my brain was in the early phases of healing.
My brain surgeon, Dr. Mark Bryniarski, who wore his surgical scrubs to the courthouse when he testified against me in Lovelace Hospital's unsuccessful attempt to get a restraining order against me. Normally his hair was longer, giving him bangs that made him look like Howdy Doody, the subject of one of the six texts I sent him.
New Mexico District Court Judge Nancy Franchini, who presided over the hearing about whether or not to grant Lovelace Hospital a restraining order against me for the snarky texts I had sent to my brain surgeon. After I cross-examined him, the judge decided the case in my favor and denied the restraining order.
The house I lived in on Mesa Drive in Southeast Albuquerque, NM, that I had to sell in order to have some money when I was not able to work in the time immediately after surgery.
My next door neighbor Stephanie, who was practicing feeding my dogs, Skipper and Nico, in my kitchen on Mesa Drive. I re-homed them to her family when I moved from the house into an apartment, so that their routine of getting on her school bus in the mornings would not have to change.
Philips Chapel Church, Albuquerque, NM, which I joined few years after brain surgery. I was able to pay forward the generosity of my Realtor, who gave me money for the deposit on my apartment, by helping a chuch friend who'd come from Wisconsin for heart surgery to find and furnish a temporary place to stay.
My social worker Tori and I in the apartment I moved into shortly after I sold my house on Mesa Drive. She put me in contact with a former co-worker of hers, Beverly, who also had a brain tumor.
At a Brain Injury conference held on the campus of University of New Mexico in October, 2018. Second from left is Beverly, a brain tumor survivor my social worker introduced me to. On the far right is the woman who told me that a 14 lb. pound block of chocolate had fallen on her head, causing her to have a severe brain injury.
Me at a neuro-acupunture demostration. The neuro-acupuncturist in the center, Dr. Shawn Weeks, treated me after the neuro-acupuncturist next to me, Dr. Natasha Wells, told me she thought she was black as a child and asked me whether I had any funny stories about being black.
After my second visit to Valeria Rios' middle school art class at Cien Aguas Middle School in Albuquerque, her students made this collage in response to a prompt I had given them to make art from materials already in the classroom. I had visited her class to talk about my artwork the first time shortly before my diagnosis, when I was unable to stand up the whole time, and a second time about one year after surgery.
I saw a therapist during the whole multi-surgical adventure. One day I met with a therapist who did Sand Tray therapy, where clients select from hundreds of figurines and then position the selected objects in a tray of sand. When the therapist saw that I'd placed a toilet in the middle of my tray, she said, "You've been going through a lot of shit, haven't you?"
Rigdzin Darma Foundation, in Albuquerque, NM, a Buddhist Temple where on the tenth anniversary of my accident in the ocean in The Bahamas, I took Triple Refuge in an emotional ceremony on April 12, 2018.
A picture taken from the outside of the Rigdzin Darma Foundation, where on the tenth anniversary of my accident in the Bahamas, I took the Triple Refuge, a way of formally accepting the Buddhist teachings.
The Bosque, the 16-mile path through Albuquerque, New Mexico that I began walking along for exercise when I was no longer able to tolerate the fluorescent lights and loud music inside of most health clubs.
My childhood friend Jackie, whom I got back in touch with after posting my diagnosis on Facebook. Her telling me about having had successful breast reduction surgery made me decide to research, and eventually have, breast reduction surgey myself, after my breasts became assymetrical after brain surgery left me unable to eat and I lost a lot of weight everywhere but in my right breast.
Dr. Gladys Tsau-Wu, my breast reduction surgeon, who told me that my larger breast was so long that I could almost tuck it into the waistband of my pants. She performed breast reduction surgery on me on October 8, 2018 at a Lovelace Hospital surgery center. The procedure took four hours and I went home the same day.
Angel Sandoval, a girl who had an inoperable brain tumor since birth, about whom I had written an article for the Albuquerque Journal. She knitted scarves and then gave them to her health care providers as a way to distract herself from overthinking her situation. I would later find out that she was the step-granddaughter of Mama Nkasi. In the years following my surgeries, I would find the same solace in making artwork and giving it to my surgeons, who, like Angel's caregivers, weren't expecting a gift.