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Student glad
to be home after surgery
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| High school student Noah
Watkins, center, with his mother, Cheryl Williams, left, grandmother
Deborah Benning and brother, Jacob. Noah returned home last week after
he underwent surgery to remove a benign brain tumor. |
The family of high school student Noah Watkins feels
very lucky. After doctors discovered the young man had a brain tumor two
weeks ago, the tumor was removed and now Noah is back home and back to
his old self: up, walking around and teasing his younger brother.
“We feel blessed,” said Noah’s
grandmother, Deborah Benning, who is clerk of Village Council. “He’s
recovering very quickly.”
But the sudden health crisis precipitated a new
challenge to the family. Because the surgery was only partially covered
by insurance, and because Noah’s mother, Cheryl Williams, had to leave
her job to care for her son, the family faces new financial difficulties.
On the advice of friends, Noah’s family is
asking the community for donations. And while Benning and Williams are grateful
for the response of friends and family so far, they know their bills will
be huge and they will continue to face financial uncertainty.
Those interested in helping may contribute to a
fund in Noah’s name that has been set up at the Yellow Springs Credit
Union, or may put donations in jars at The Emporium, the Dayton Street Gulch
and Peach’s Grill.
The family’s crisis began several weeks ago
when Noah suffered a severe migraine headache that lasted more than a week.
Tests revealed he had a brain tumor, and surgery was scheduled for March
31. However, when on March 26 Noah began having seizures and became incoherent,
he was taken by ambulance to Grandview Hospital, where doctors said the
tumor had to be removed immediately, Williams said. A surgical team was
assembled in a few hours and that same day doctors removed the tumor during
a six-hour surgery.
Now, Noah is stabilized, back home again and recovering.
On Saturday the family celebrated his return with an open house, during
which a stream of family and friends visited the Williams’ Corry Street
apartment.
Asked how many relatives he has in town, Noah replied
with a laugh, “Oh, about a thousand.” Not quite that many, said
his grandmother, although Yellow Springs has been home to the Bennings,
her father’s family, since the early 1800s, and Noah has in the area
many cousins, aunts, uncles and great-aunts and great-uncles from the Benning,
Cordell or Hamilton families.
To his family and friends, Noah, who is 17, is known
as a quiet and reserved young man — “He thinks about things
a lot,” said Benning — who also has a silly and playful streak
and can sometimes be found chasing his little brother, 13-year-old Jacob,
around the apartment. Since Noah was a youngster he’s been fascinated
with taking things apart and putting them back together again, and he’s
followed that interest by studying auto mechanics at the Greene County Career
Center. Although he will be home-schooled the rest of this year, Noah said
that he looks forward to returning to the Career Center for his senior year
in the fall and he hopes to pursue a career in auto mechanics by attending
the Baran Institute of Technology.
While doctors removed most of the tumor, which was
found to be benign, they had to leave behind a tiny part that could possibly
grow again, Benning said. To keep an eye on that possibility, Noah will
undergo testing every few months.
But right now Noah and his family are celebrating
his rapid return to health. On Saturday, after the open house, he, his mother,
grandmother and brother headed out to Toys R Us to purchase a few new video
games, since doctors ordered Noah to play video games at least three hours
a day to improve his eye-hand coordination.
The large smile on Noah’s face Saturday seemed
to say he didn’t mind his required therapy one bit, and that he was
very glad to be home.
—Diane Chiddister |
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