Cholesteatoma Surgery, Round 2

December 2nd, 2009 | Posted in » My Life / Family

If you know me or have been following my blog for a while, you know I’ve been battling a cholesteatoma tumor (basically a benign growth in the middle ear that results in hearing loss) for a while (see here and here).

On Monday, I had my second round of surgery to correct the problem. It’s got a long technical name, of course (something along the lines of “revision tympanoplasty mastoidectomy” something or other), but the basic procedure was almost identical to before… general anesthetic (a real trip if you’ve never had it), a nice long incision (one that apparently comes pretty darned close to lopping off my ear completely), doctors’ inspection / removal of any regrowth of the tumor, reconstruction of the bones of the middle ear (yep, bionic man, that’s me), and then a patch job to put me back together (I’m sure they use superglue / duct tape in the process somehow).

All in all, it’s an amazing procedure, and according to doctors, it was a complete success… there was no tumor regrowth, and the reconstruction went smoothly. With no damage to nerves evident (from hearing tests prior to surgery), I’m expected to regain nearly all of my hearing.

So now there’s the healing process. I can’t hear completely YET, so for now, be sure to talk into my RIGHT ear if you really need me to hear you.

But remember, that won’t last forever. One of these days I’m gonna surprise all of you who think you can get away with saying things you really don’t want me to hear simply by talking on my left side!