Search options (Page 20 of 43)

My younger daughter, Holly, the one who re-christened herself ‘Holz’ aged 6-years, is now 18 years old. She is a bubbly, lanky ball of fun; a riotous confusion of teenage emotions and passions.

Whilst queuing to see Justin Bieber and Rhianna perform at the ‘V’ Music festival last weekend, and ‘out of the blue,’ she suffered an instantaneous spasm, lost her vision, vomited and passed-out.

Putting it down to anticipation, sheer excitement, poor diet and the heat, she recovered in time for the performances and didn’t inform her parents of the incident.

On Tuesday during a shift at work in Costas Coffee (like a UK version of Starbucks), she suddenly went blind and passed out.

She was evacuated to hospital and transferred to an emergency neurology unit.

This time her parents knew about it.

The thing is, that my Father-in-law, Holz’s grandad, died aged 60 due to an aggressive and inoperable brain tumour. He died as Holly was being born. He lived with us during his decline for as long as was possible, and his initial symptoms? Well, ‘out of the blue,’ he’d suffer instantaneous spasms, lose his vision, vomit and pass-out.

If I develop my writing skills from now to the end of my days, I’ll never be able to adequately express the anxiety, fear, anguish and sheer terror that I experienced as I drove half the length of the UK within four hours to reach her bedside.

By the time I arrived she’d been blood-tested and CRT-Scanned and tested from head to foot and If I develop my writing skills from now to the end of my days, I’ll never be able to adequately express the sheer joy and euphoric happiness that flooded my soul to find that all tests were negative; white blood cell count = normal, MRI CT Scan shows nothing abnormal… nothing nasty is obvious anywhere. Checked and re-checked.

From the plumbing depths of desperation to riding the peak of euphoric happiness within five hours.

The roller-coaster. The gallows drop. A blip. A shock. A rude awakening.

‘I don’t need days like that,’ I thought on Tuesday night. By Thursday night I know that I do need days like that. It takes a day like that in order to know what you have and what you might lose.

I’m going to be a much better father, this day forward.