Finally, we meet.

After a few more vision and balance tests, Dr. Greene got out the MRI scans. It was the first time my wife and I had a chance to see the tumor. It was a white round mass in the center of my brain. Dr. Greene explained that that was good -- a round tumor was easier to kill than one that had tendrils that wrapped around the folds of the brain.

When you've got a brain tumor you take your good news when you can get it.

The bad news was that this was in the very center of my brain, making it very risky for them to try to go after it surgically. One wrong move and I could be blind, lose motor functions or even die. Dr. Greene, though a highly-skilled neurosurgeon, was not in favor of surgery.

However.

There was a type of treatment that went after tumors of this type; ones that were hard to reach. It essentially shot highly-focused beams of radiation from multiple angles that converged on the spot to kill the tumor. Instead of carving your brain up like Swiss cheese, the beams were only effective/dangerous (depending on if you're a glass half-full/half-empty kinda person) when they met. If this was the path they were going to go down, I'd only get one treatment, one shot of radiation.

A ray of hope!