By Todd Ceisner
BassFan Editor
Aaron Martens is ready for a fight. He’s just waiting to find out the identity of his opponent.
Martens has been back at his home in Leeds, Ala., for a little more than a week after undergoing an operation to remove a lesion from his brain. That and one other abnormality were found during tests after Martens fell ill during a fishing outing with two friends on April 4. What Martens described as periods of “feeling euphoric” were seizures and they happened more rapidly and with greater intensity as the day wore on.
After being driven home, he was rushed to Grandview Medical Center in Birmingham, where a CT scan revealed two lesions. Two days later, doctors removed one lesion so additional testing could be done. Martens said the other lesion is located in a less accessible area of his brain. Martens and his family are still awaiting the outcome of pathology tests.
“There is still some stuff to deal with, for sure,” Martens said when reached by phone Wednesday evening. “It’s not over, that’s for sure. It’s looking to be a fight ahead of us. I like fighting, though.”
Martens sounded in good spirits as his two kids played video games in the background while his wife, Lesley, prepared dinner. A doctor visit earlier in the day was followed by a few hours spent doing tackle and affixing decals to his truck. A three-mile evening walk with Lesley around their neighborhood was still on his agenda.
Because of the seizure medication he’s currently taking, Martens said he’s not allowed to drive for now.
“I can drive the boat, but I know the vehicle would be a bad idea,” he said.
Doctors have also put the kibosh on his workout routine, which annoyed him because he was closing in on hitting his goal of running 30 miles and totaling 1,000 push-ups in a week.
“I feel good physically,” said Martens, who has long been an avid hiker and runner. “They’re not letting me run, which stinks.”
He says his appetite is good and his stamina is such that he’s been out fishing a couple times since being home with two-time Bassmaster High School national champion Tucker Smith and Robbey Stanford, Smith’s uncle. Smith attends Briarwood Christian School in Birmingham with Martens’ daughter, Jordan.
“I fished all day in the current the other day and we caught ‘em pretty good,” Martens said.
He sensed the fishing was going to be good, as well, on the day he fell ill. Martens recalled feeling a bit tired that day, but he opted to go fishing with Smith and Stanford.
“I’d been having episodes is what I called them,” Martens said. “They weren’t major seizures, but I felt funny for a little while, then they’d go away. That day, they were a little more serious. I don’t remember the ambulance ride or anything like that.
“They just started happening. The day before, I had a few, but they were real mild. It was like a euphoric feeling.”
Initially, Martens thought he might be allergic to the pollen in the fields near where they’d been fishing.
“I’d smell certain things, but the smells were in my brain,” he said. “There seemed to be certain odors that set it off. It seemed like it would happen by fields with a lot of grass in them like ragweed. I’d smell the pollen, but maybe that was triggering it. The doctors don’t know. They were more euphoric, like they felt good, then they got more serious.”
He said the seizures continued at the hospital.
“They were real bad. It made me feel scared. It wasn’t good,” he said. “The nurses were praying over me.”
Because of the restrictions on visitors at hospitals now due to the coronavirus pandemic, Martens’ family members were unable to see him other than via video chats over the phone.
On Monday, April 6, doctors performed an operation to remove one lesion.
“They went in and opened my skull up,” he said.
To which any astute follower of the sport would interject, “So those doctors got a look at the one thing many in the bass fishing world have been clamoring to see for years?”
“Yeah, they saw it,” Martens said with a slight chuckle. “I’ve got about 30 staples in there now. I’ve got like a zipper on the front of my head. I’m tired of that.”
On Thursday, the staples were removed and a fishing trip to Logan Martin Lake followed with his wife. With much of the country on lockdown and the Bass Pro Tour season on hiatus due to the coronavirus, Martens has time to muster plenty of strength for what lies ahead. During the nearly 30-minute conversation, the three-time Bassmaster Angler of the Year expressed his gratitude for all of the well wishes and support he’s received over the past two weeks.
“It was a humbling experience to know that many people were thinking about you,” he said. “I have a lot of good friends out there. I can’t believe the number of people who messaged me and have been praying for me.”
For now, the wait for a definitive diagnosis continues, but Martens promised to be ready for whatever is in store.
“I’m just trying to stay active,” he said. “I’m not going to let it knock me down. It sounds like no matter what route we’re going to take we’ll probably be getting into chemo or radiation. We’ll see how strong I am.”
