Brain surgery gives teen new outlook

Amanda Cook was only in fifth grade at Bigfork Elementary when the migraines started.

Debilitating to the point where they made her physically sick, the headaches seemed to be triggered by a sensitivity to light. Fluorescent lighting was the worst.

They continued through her sixth-grade year at Bigfork Middle School.

In seventh grade, she had her first seizure as she was Christmas shopping with her dad in a Salt Lake City store. All she remembered were the bright lights, then fading vision, then complete blackness.

She woke up in Primary Children's Medical Center in Salt Lake City, where doctors were putting her through a series of tests.

What they found was not good.

"I was born with a cluster in my head," Cook said as she described the tangled mass of veins and arteries the doctors discovered. "They clumped up and killed off part of my brain."

Immediately, she went on a regimen of medicine for the seizures. (After adjustments for allergies, her maturing body and a seizure-free period followed by a relapse, she is back to two doses a day. She knows treatment is a moving target and is something she will have to monitor indefinitely.)

Step two was brain surgery.

Before the operation, doctors warned her to expect some memory loss.

During the seven- to eight-hour operation, surgeons removed the portion of her brain which had died and then untangled the cluster of blood vessels.

"I wasn't scared going into it," Cook said. She was ready to get out of the hospital in a couple of days. And she never did lose memory.

Now, as Cook prepares for graduation from Bigfork High School this Saturday - and for becoming the first one in her family to attend college - she is doing exceptionally well in managing the aftermath.

"I'm excited," she said, looking forward to her four years at University of Montana-Western in Dillon. "I don't think it's going to be that hard. I hope it's not like high school - you blink your eyes and it's gone."

Ever since she made her mind up that she was going to college, in the middle of her medical ordeals between fifth and seventh grades, she has set about making sure college would happen.

"My folks [Joe and Jodi Cook] think it's great," she said. "They've been real supportive."

Amanda's early ambition in middle school was to be an elementary teacher. Over the years, that refined itself to studies in child psychology and finally a career goal in early childhood education.

"I want to get a degree and run a low-income day care" back home in Bigfork, she said.

"Most people wouldn't want to come back here. I think I'd be lost if I moved away. I grew up here and most of my family is here."

To make college a reality, Cook signed on with Upward Bound in the summer following her eighth-grade year. She has stayed with the college-prep program ever since.

Through Upward Bound, Cook also completed two college courses and visited college campuses last summer.

"I really didn't think I had a chance to go to college," Cook said of her prospects before Upward Bound.

But the program "sounded really fun," she said, and the free price tag translated into her attitude that it was better than a summer job. It also offered training in how to go about applying for financial aid to make college dreams a reality.

Because of her persistence with UM Western, her early-bird attitude toward grant, loan and scholarship applications - beating the deadline by a month on her Free Application for Federal Student Aid landed her an extra $100 - and her pursuit of varied sources, she received a financial aid package that leaves her paying only $2,000 out of pocket for her first year.

UM Western just put in place a new four-year curriculum for early childhood development, providing the final lure for Cook.

She admits she's not big on studying, but said she's a pretty good listener and remembers what is taught in class. And she's up for a challenge.

"Math is hard, but I really like it," she said. "It's the most interesting class I have."

She's excited about her high school graduation Saturday, when she will bid farewell to memories of speech and debate participation, after-school jobs and times spent with classmates.

Quite possibly, though, she's more excited about the path she will be blazing as she becomes the first in her family to gain a college education.

"When my parents were young - they had us really young - my mom was a teenage mom and my dad really wanted to go to college," Cook said.

"So I decided real young I would be one of those people who would go to college, I wouldn't struggle like they did. It just sounded like fun.

"And," she added, "I wanted to make my family proud."

Reporter Nancy Kimball can be reached at 758-4483 or by e-mail at nkimball@dailyinterlake.com