Translation: I must ride my bicycle again
I’m alive!
‘I must ride my bicycle again!’
66-year-old Egbert-Jan Ruijs from Barchem feels blessed; he’s had an angel on his shoulder ever since he was diagnosed with cancer. He now has a partially artificial skull.
“I really enjoyed riding my bicycle. It is what I did that day, five years ago. Suddenly everything blacked out before my eyes and I fell on the ground, just a few inches away from a moat. I could have easily fallen into the water and drowned. Luckily it didn’t take long before someone found me and before I knew it I was in an ambulance.
Research determined that I had a tumor in my brain, a meningioma. I was immediately informed of the fact that it concerned a slow-growing tumor that can often be removed completely. And so it happened.
The day after my surgery I was taken to a rehabilitation center where it was touch-and-go again. I passed out in the shower. In the hospital it turned out that I had an abcess, an inflammation, right where the tumor had been. I had to undergo another surgery on my skull and the doctors saw that my tumor was actually an atypical variant that could in fact grow rapidly.
Not everything had been taken out. It was a blessing in disguise because otherwise the doctors would have never found out.
Ratiation treatment was inevitable. It damaged my vestibular area; at a certain point I was not even able to walk. But I am very stubborn, so as soon as the radiation treatment was over, I started my recovery. I no longer use my wheelchair, zimmer frame or cane and I plan on getting back on my bicycle. I now own a tricycle and am not ashamed of it for one bit. I will ride a bicycle again.