This is my husband, Kevin and I with our three beautiful kids. This is his story...

Since this blog is about Kevin and his journey through the diagnosis, removal and recovery or an acoustic neuroma, I thought it best to start at the beginning and explain how we came to find out that he actually had an acoustic neuroma.

An acoustic neuroma is defined as: a benign (noncancerous), slow growing tumor of the nerve that connects the ear to the brain.

On July 7, 2009, Kevin left for The United States Army basic training in Ft. Benning GA. It was one of the most difficult choices we had made up to that point as a family, but we were proud and about as prepared as we could be. While in reception at Ft. Benning, Kevin failed the routine hearing test given to all new recruits. After retaking, and failing it a second time, and going over a list of symptoms, such as tinnitus, dizziness, facial numbness, difference in taste and frequent headaches, it was decided that he would go off base for an MRI.

On August 12, Kevin was told he had an acoustic neuroma. He was also told that his services would not be needed in the Army and he was going to be discharged with what is called existing prior to service. Of course that was not one but two blows to us, but great news as well...He was coming home!!

After he was home, his sister passed along his story to her husband's brother, who, (lucky for us) is an ENT. He was kind enough to allow us to come into his office and dig a little deeper and figure out what our options were. We found out that Kevin had an 8mm by 8mm acoustic neuroma on the left side. It was sitting on the 7th and 8th cranial nerves, which were his hearing and facial nerves. We were also told that he had less than 10% of his hearing on that side. He referred us to another ENT, Dr. Pensak, closer to home, at UC Medical Center in Cincinnati Ohio.

We made the appointment to meet with Dr. Pensak as well as a neurosurgeon, Dr. Theodosopoulos (Dr. Theo). They informed us of the different surgical options as well as non-surgical options. Because of Kevin's age (35), and the fact he had pretty severe symptoms, we (along with the Dr.'s), decided that the Translabyrinthine approach was the best option for Kevin. With this approach, the hearing is completely destroyed, but since the brain stem is not manipulated, it is considered the safest treatment. The surgery was scheduled for March 18, 2010.