Wendy, as you see and others have shared, there is no set reaction we all experience from this surgery. I had a burst 30+ years ago. You and your husband are concerned you won’t remember him. When I woke up I remembered the people, but not necessarily their names. I remembered my fiancee, but not his name. I lost a lot of my long term memory—the specifics—but not the general ideas of where I lived, how I was raised, that I went to school. Though I lost most of my education of my degrees. For the past 30 years I have made it my mission to relearn. I read to my children, I took jobs that scared me, and I pushed myself to learn it all again. Even now I will see a word I have not relearned, so I look it up and take the time to relearn it.
I still have some short memory challenges — though I also see my friends forget things and their brain didn’t burst — sometimes I think I am just more conscious of it. And, like others, I have found ways to adapt— lists, placement habits, calmness in my life.
It is impossible to guess how your brain will react to the surgery. But the fact you are aware it is going to happen, that you are able to prepare with your husband, puts you miles ahead of some of us. Just please be patient with yourself and each other. Let yourself heal at the speed your body demands. And if you loose any memory, try not to be angry or frustrated, instead try to keep in mind that every day is a new day to make new memories.
As my children were learning to walk and would look behind them at others I would regularly say: look where you are going, not where you have been. I try hard to live with that lesson myself and invite you to do the same.