For bpham:
The first week is pretty early. Take a month at least, it is a lot of information to try and digest. In the first week, I was pretty worked up, and it took a little while to let things settle down in my mind so I could see the overall picture reasonably well.
I'm 53. My primary symptoms are hearing loss, tinnitus, and the fullness feeling. I have had various tweaky twitchy things now and then, but only the ones that are there every day really matter. Although the hearing loss did start a year ago, in the last 8 months the symptoms have emerged quite clearly.
I want to have treatment now, rather than later, because I think the symptoms would just get worse if I waited, and treatment is easier when the AN is small. I have chosen radiation over surgery, because I think the chances for preserving my remaining hearing are better, the chance for new side effects is lower, and the thought of someone cutting a hole through my skull gives me the hebbie jebbies.
I have chosen CK over GK, because it has a somewhat higher hearing preservation rate, doesn't require a frame bolted to my head, and perhaps mainly because the level of communication available with the CK doctors is so much better. The doctors answering questions on the cyberknife forum, and Dr. Chang answering personal emails promptly and thoroughly, even on weekends, was a real factor in my mind.
I will hazard some guesses on what you might expect your outcome would be from CK, given that I am not an expert or a doctor, every AN is different, and even the experts can't tell from an MRI just exactly how your AN is interconnected with nearby nerves and arteries, and so can't tell you exactly what will happen in your case. Having said that, I would guess that the facial twitchings would go away after the first six months, when most of the swelling induced by radiation will have gone down. They are probably more from irritation of one sort or another, not direct impact of the AN on the nerve. I would guess the ear aches have the same kind of cause, and would go away in the same way as well. The tinnitus you will very likely get to keep forever as a memento of your AN.
The balance issue is more interesting. The surgical approach is to simply snip the balance nerve, since the tumor is usually growing from it. It takes a little while for your brain to readjust, but this eliminates any bogus information from the AN side, leaving you with one clear signal from the good side, and most people recover from that quite well. For radiation, the outcome is less clear. The nerve may get zapped and die off, with much the same result as surgery. It may also remain and be able to function properly. In some cases, it remains and causes problems. There is a vestibular specialist on the cyberknife forum who can explain it more.
If the balance issue is significant, I would suggest trying to get a referral to a vestibular lab, where they can do a range of tests to evaluate the condition of the nerves and your current balance function. This can be useful in deciding whether hearing can be preserved, and for predicting what the outcome for balance is likely to be. My tests showed some "positional nystagmus", meaning my eyes start darting back and forth when I lie on my right side, but I have not noticed any effect of this. In my case it mainly indicates that the AN is indeed parked on the balance nerve. None of the doctors are anticipating a balance problem for me.
So that is my story, and I'm sticking to it. Maybe some of it will help you with your decision process.
Steve
