Ken Mooney > Quotes

“There’s just something more regular and everyday about cancer than there is about brain surgery. Brain tumours are exotic and interesting. Cancer is scary and horrible. Maybe”
― Ken Mooney, The Astrocytoma Diaries: Me & My Brain Tumour

“Maybe, just maybe, if you saw these things through my eyes, you’d be a better patient or visitor. Remember: I’m in a neurosurgery ward after all. So”
― Ken Mooney, The Astrocytoma Diaries: Me & My Brain Tumour

“And I’m ready to go downstairs, to talk for hours while people poke at my brain. To have what could be the scariest experience of my life. And what could be an experience that so few people might get to go through. This is amazing. Scary. But oh my fuck, I am going to be a”
― Ken Mooney, The Astrocytoma Diaries: Me & My Brain Tumour

“then, we reached my 30th birthday. Which went far better than anyone expected. I got to have a few drinks, to stay out until the wee hours of the morning, to share a great time with family and friends and pretending like the next 30 years”
― Ken Mooney, The Astrocytoma Diaries: Me & My Brain Tumour

“what sort of man gives a shit about tutus?”
― Ken Mooney, The Astrocytoma Diaries: Me & My Brain Tumour

“That morning, I faced some demons, I made some amends, I forgave some sins and I got ready for surgery. Threw on my pretty compression socks and my delightfully uncomfortable robes: wouldn’t it be nice if they made them in a size that actually fits man-shoulders? As someone who occasionally suffers asthma, I got a few minutes on a nebuliser before being wheeled down for surgery. I’ve”
― Ken Mooney, The Astrocytoma Diaries: Me & My Brain Tumour

“that’s what happened. I’m still not entirely sure what a shunt even is (it’s a drain for removing cerebrospinal fluid. I know that bit! I’m just not entirely sure where it is or how it actually works, or why or how or what day it is, or why after this much surgery I don’t even remember where I live…) Getting”
― Ken Mooney, The Astrocytoma Diaries: Me & My Brain Tumour

“meeting: managed to make it not hurt at all. But after the diagnosis, everything fucking hurts.”
― Ken Mooney, The Astrocytoma Diaries: Me & My Brain Tumour

“It feels weird. It feels like I’m using somebody else’s words. And in some ways I am. I haven’t exactly sat down with someone and said, “I have cancer in my brain.” But”
― Ken Mooney, The Astrocytoma Diaries: Me & My Brain Tumour

“And that’s pretty much when you start lying there, wondering how this is going to play out. (I felt sort of bad about this date, because it had been Dan’s birthday the day before. My parents brought in cupcakes and we pretended like there was a celebration and it was nice and I wasn’t awaiting surgery.) It was a weird Thursday. I took a few walks around the”
― Ken Mooney, The Astrocytoma Diaries: Me & My Brain Tumour

“Oh fucking joy.”
― Ken Mooney, The Astrocytoma Diaries: Me & My Brain Tumour

“drain off some spinal fluid (huge”
― Ken Mooney, The Astrocytoma Diaries: Me & My Brain Tumour

“to make it not hurt at all. But after the diagnosis, everything fucking”
― Ken Mooney, The Astrocytoma Diaries: Me & My Brain Tumour

“fitted with a drain”
― Ken Mooney, The Astrocytoma Diaries: Me & My Brain Tumour

“Don’t go to art galleries or museums with me. Ever. (Sorry Dan.) And…”
― Ken Mooney, The Astrocytoma Diaries: Me & My Brain Tumour

“proper work surface. The worst bit was the drilling, and that memory remains to this day. I can handle everything else, but the sound of a bone-saw cutting your skull open is not something anyone should ever experience. It is horrible, and it oscillates at about the same pitch as a lawnmower.”
― Ken Mooney, The Astrocytoma Diaries: Me & My Brain Tumour

“It’s also sweaty as balls in Dublin at the moment, so any attempt to stick tape to me and keep this in place was doomed from the beginning. So with the drain going in on a Tuesday, it was coming out of its own accord by the Saturday. By that stage, I was draining slowly and feeling fine. It would have been better to have it in and live with it for a week or so and three days isn’t really enough. The plan was to try and get it back in, ideally by CT. But this kind of procedure wasn’t a huge priority for a weekend.”
― Ken Mooney, The Astrocytoma Diaries: Me & My Brain Tumour