Meghan Gamble

Welcome to our CaringBridge website. We are using it to keep family and friends updated in one place. We appreciate your support and words of hope and encouragement. Thank you for visiting.
Meghan had her first brain surgery four years ago. She had been experiencing seizures that were not controlled through medication well and was forced to give up one of her favorite activities, swimming. After trying many different medications, we were told that our next step would be surgery. A very scary thought to her parents, but to give Meghan a chance for a good life, we decided we had to go that path. At the time, we were told Meghan had a lesion in her left temporal lobe of the  brain. It was very close to the hippocampus, which is important for memory and speech. The surgeons assured us that they could operate safely and that our little girl would still be able to talk and create memories. The surgery she had on June 13th, 2013 was a success. Meghan stopped experiencing seizures. She did not have the easiest recovery as her bone flap was infected so she was back at the hospital for two more surgeries while they doctors tried to figure out why her wound was not healing. The bone flap was removed and with that her wound healed fast.  However, Meghan had to get a PIC line to be treated for the infection, so July flew by and she was still forbidden to go in the pool. By August she was finished treatment but would return to school without the bone flap. She was allowed to swim again and she got back in the pool. It was a long, hard journey back to fitness in the pool but Meghan persevered. At the end of the summer 2014, after being free from seizures a full year, Meghan had some testing and was told she could stop taking the anti-seizure medications. What a wonderful feeling to not have to take pills every day and off the medication Meghan enjoyed school more as well as improved as a student.
Fast forward four years and Meghan is once again getting ready for surgery. At her yearly MRI appointment in April, it was discovered that her tumor had recurred. Meghan's doctor was as shocked as we were. He said that it needed to come out but we could wait until school was out if we wanted. Meghan wanted to finish out her sophomore year, so we scheduled for after school was done. The doctors seem optimistic that they can remove the tumor. They will be more aggressive than last time as the tumor is not as close to the hippocampus. Meghan can also stay asleep for the operation. She was awake for the other surgeries since the surgeons needed to make sure they didn't affect her speech.  We are lucky to have the same surgeons as 4 years ago and we hope that Meghan's surgery will successfully remove the whole tumor so she can get back to being a normal sixteen year old.