Yvonne Foong: Fighting NF

I had just told Dr. Lekovic about the difficulty of raising my voice or singing high pitches. He felt that it’s associated with the ninth and tenth cranial nerves. That is the Glasopharyngeal Nerve and Vagus Nerve.

Upon reading that reply of his, I remembered about a brain tumor of mine located at the Jugular Foramen that Dr. Friedman found by chance and debulked it while implanting my ABI in 2006. That tumor involved the ninth and tenth cranial nerves.

Although I failed to alert the doctors as soon as I began to experience weakness in my phranyx, we discovered the causal tumor eventually two years later durinng surgery to remove a totally different brain tumor.

Read about this miracle I received while obtaining the Auditory Brainstem Implant!.

I wish I could meet all the people who helped me raise funds for the A.B.I and explain to them how their support and belief has unwittingly saved my life.

To containue having my surgery done by doctors at HEI, we need to raise a lot of money. And sometimes, I do feel bad because many other NF patients may never get the chance. Some may even be Americans and never get the chance. But my surgeons and I have been through one battle after another, one victory after another, one miracle after another, that I would never want to leave their side.

I used to feel so vulnerable, fearing for my life, until I met my doctors at HEI.

In December 2009 as I remained lying down while the nurses prepared me for surgery, Dr. Lekovic came in and informed me that the tumor we were going to remove – the Trigone Meningioma – had grown by 1cm and became harder to remove. I felt no fear at all. I trusted Dr. Lekovic and Dr. Schwartz to make the best decisions for me every step of the way. I trusted that they will not take chances at the expense of my livelihood.

Sometimes, people don’t understand why I need to go to L.A.

It’s not the place. It’s the people.