I think I was lucky. Epilepsy is an absolute nightmare and the only thing that stopped my fear of surgery was being engrossed by my last semesters of college. I did understate some issues... It made my English just worse. I am basically a different person now (disdain for what I once liked and love for things I never noticed). Things recovered with practice, like memorizing lyrics and reading. The brain is an amazing thing and I believe physical and mental exercise helps your neurons find new, more stable pathways that aren't through the broken part of the brain. But it would be a different story if they had to remove like half of my hippocampus. I will never regret this surgery despite it turning me into a completely different person.