LAFAYETTE, La. — At only 47 years old, Cliff Roy, Jr. went to the hospital for elevated blood pressure, but he was soon confronted by his doctor with much bigger news.
"I didn't have any symptoms. He said 'It was a small stroke.' He said 'But you had stroke.' He says 'And you have a brain mass,'" Roy said.
Roy said the mass had likely been growing on his brain's cerebellum for 15 to 20 years before he ever knew, though there had been some other signs.
"I'm hearing-impaired in my right ear. I have tinnitus, and I lost my hearing. I assumed it was because of, you know, a loud weed eater, something I did without hearing protection but found out that the tumor was the cause of the tinnitus and the hearing loss," he said.
Knowing he was in good health otherwise, Roy decided to have brain surgery, so in December of last year, he and his family traveled to Shreveport for the procedure.
"You wake up from surgery, and the way you went in is not the way you come out," Roy said. "You have the scar, but then I had some pinholes in my head. I went to sleep with one IV. I had three; I had one in each arm and one in my groin."
Of course, the surgery isn't the end of Roy's journey. Really, it's only the beginning.
"The recovery for most people—a lot of people that have brain surgery—they're going to have trouble walking, you know, because your equilibrium's off," he said. "I'm pretty determined or stubborn—whatever somebody wants to deem it as being, so I got up the next day and walked."
Only three days after surgery, Roy went home.
"The first day afterward, I walked. The next day, I stood up and took a shower, and then the third day, I was ready to roll," Roy said.
And roll he did.
Roy said he immediately started walking around as much as possible to regain his balance and return to normal life as quickly as he could, and by January 2nd, he had returned to work.
Now, nearly nine months after his initial diagnosis, Roy's brain tumor journey continues as he shares his story.
"One of the things I advocate for and I tell people, we need to push for the doctors to make an MRI or a CT a regular, routine check because there could be things in someone's brain that could be causing different reactions in their body, and we can be trying to pursue the solution and not getting to the root of the cause," Roy said.
So, no matter how small the symptom may seem, don't hesitate to check with your healthcare provider.
