IMAGINE being told that you might never see again.
That was the reality Johanne Turner, 37, from Southend, was faced with after she emerged from an operation to remove a tumour from her brain. Johanne’s legal career was halted when she was diagnosed with a walnut-sized brain tumour in November 2007.
She had been living with painful headaches for ten years but never thought they were connected to a serious medical condition.
Doctors at Southend Hospital told her she could be left without vision or speech, if they did not act immediately.
Johanne went under the knife at Queens Hospital, Romford, to have a small section of her brain removed.
Just two months after the operation Mrs Turner went back to the job she loved, as a solicitor specialising in personal injury. She has recently been made a partner at BTMK, on Clifftown Road, Southend.

Here she talks to Louise Howeson.

 

 

"I could not stop looking at the clock because, at any moment, my eyesight could be gone forever.

I had just had an eight-hour brain operation to remove a walnut-sized brain tumour.

My left eye had no sight, it was just black, but I could see out of my right eye. The doctors had said that the other eye could lose its sight as well and they would only know after 24 hours.

I am an optimistic person who does not dwell on the negative, but in that time I was worried. I wanted to see my fiance’s face and my parents.

Also, in my job as a solicitor, I needed my sight. Thankfully my sight did not deteriorate in my right eye and it was only partially gone in the left side.

My journey had started with bad headaches. They were not your normal run-of-the mill headaches – they were very, very painful.

I have always had a “get on with it” attitude and when a headache would hit, I would take a tablet and just carry on working.

I think you naturally rationalise things in your mind. I didn’t think there was any reason I had the headaches, I just got through them and then forgot about them. The doctors said later that the tumour might have been growing for up to 20 years, but then they couldn’t say for sure. It had not impacted on my health, until one Friday night my eyesight went a bit funny and my surroundings looked a bit skewed. I woke up fine on the Saturday, so I relaxed and forgot about it.

Then on the Sunday afternoon, suddenly everything I could see was the wrong way and back to front. It really scared me and that’s when I knew something was up.

We drove to the hospital and all the cars of the left side were coming at me from the right. It was a very bizarre experience.

Even then I felt relaxed, because I had it in my head that the doctors would need to fix my eyesight. I never thought it was a brain tumour.

I hadn’t even mentioned the headaches to my boyfriend Scott, except in passing, so it all came as a bit of a shock for him.

I do think in those circumstances it is harder being the family than the patient. As a patient you are cushioned from things and are given an action plan. For family and friends it must seem a lot more real and scary.

The doctor sent me for a CT scan and we were told it was a tumour. I did panic a bit at this point, but I think I was in shock as well. I am quite pragmatic, so once I knew, I wanted to get on with it. They were such a great team and I trusted them.

The tumour was confirmed with an MIR scan and I was told it had impacted on my optimal nerve and that is why it had affected my sight.

I was sent to Queens Hospital for the operation. They did not have to shave my hair off unbelievably, just a little bit along the incision line from ear to ear at the back of the head. The nurses were so sweet they plaited the hair either side to keep it back.

Whenever I see the scar, I think I was brave. I didn’t have a lot of choice in the matter, but I am proud of how I handled it all. It taught me to value things. I value my sight so much now and being able to see and live a normal life. I am partially sighted, but that just means I avoid very dangerous things!

Apart from that I live a normal life. I married my fiancé shortly after. We had been together for 20 years and had put off marriage. Suddenly life seemed a little bit too short to put off the things that are important."