Absence of fear* - Jewel

"Please lie down", she asked me. I lay flat down on the bed while she draws the curtains. She walks over to me and points to my pants buckle - "Can you undo this?"

Yeah, sure! I did. She pulled up my shirt and started feeling all over my body...

Then she started asking me questions. Do I smoke? etc., etc. This was one of the many initial check-ups i went for some time last year. Not too long after this check-up, i saw her again. But she was just one of the many doctors who surrounded me as the senior doctor talked to me. I was expecting the same - nothing in the scan, no concerns, should be alright. But the presence of so many junior doctors with worried looks on their faces hinted otherwise.

It was all over in a few moments - the senior doctor broke the news to me and showed me the scans. Basically, i have a huge tumor in my head and i need to get it cut out.

Ok. I have to go and check with my insurers first and i'll let them know. The junior doctors leave, perhaps a little disappointed that there was no 'show' to see - no cries of disbelief, no refusal to accept the truth, no breaking down in tears.

But mind you, it was indeed serious. Dun take my word for it - look at the scans:-

The doctor wasn't exaggerating when he said the tunor was the size of a tennis ball. Look at the space it was taking inside my head!

But yet, the really really strange thing was that despite being totally unprepared for it, there was no fear in me. I went by the next few weeks and months making all the arrangements but yet i cannot remember once when i felt fear. The biggest fear i felt was prolly before the results came out, when i had to go thru the MRI scan. In fact, recently, i went to the dentist and i had more fear in me than before my major brain surgery!!!!

I even made jokes about and took it rather lightly at times. When my mom touched my forehead, i feigned pain which really scared her. Naughty boy, i am. I even told my frens that i made up a song for my situation - to the tune of The Cranberries 'Zombie'. It went "In my hea-ad, in my he-e-a-ad, tu-u-mor, tu-mor, tumor, mor, mor...".

The week before my surgery, i was at Disneyland! The day b4 the surgery when i had to check into the hospital, i was late cuz i was having Häagen-Dazs ice cream wif me mates.

Looking back, my family must have ben worried sick, especially on the morning of the operation, when they came and wheeled me away. Me? I was worried that i might get motion sickness lying on the wheelie bed thingy!

It is only recently when i begin to realise how serious my situation was. Each time i go for a follow-up check-up, the doctor will ask me questions about problems tt i could be facing. Praise God i did not have any of them - but i begin to see how so many thing could have gone wrong. It was after all a surgery on the brain - i could lose some senses, lose some ability to think or to balance or to control my limbs.

And as i look back at those scans now, it scares me a little.

But i was not scared at all previously!!! I am not boasting - i give all credit and glory to God. It was him who gave me the strength to go thru the months b4 the op. It was him who gave me peace thruout that time. It was him who ensured that there was an absence of fear in me.

*The final track in her album 'Spirit', my fav album of hers! The track contained a 'hidden' song too, an a capella duet with her mom.