Good News at a Price

Good News

The good news was obtained during surgery. They found more cancer than they expected, but were able to get it all out and get "clear margins" meaning there was no trace of cancer in the area around where they took out tumor. We still have a formal pathology report to wait for, but this is as good as it gets until then.

And the Price

The hard part was that they could not save my left eye and it had to go during surgery. They also had to remove the cheekbone directly below the eye, which they filled in with tissue and a bit of muscle from my left leg (which now matches my right leg with a big scar on it). Unfortunately, that was not all. They also found that the tumor had reached across my jawbone to the joint on the left side and had to remove the joint to get the tumor there. So now my jawbone is unsupported on the left side and my teeth do not line up any more. What a mess. We may be able to fix the mess later with plastic/dental surgery.

So, I am now dealing with life with one eye, a messed up jawbone that makes eating hard, and problems swallowing. But I am alive, and am cancer free, at least as far as we know for now.

Pre-op

We drove over to Houston on Monday morning, on what is becoming a routine trip. This time, we booked a room, actually a suite, in the Rotary House, a hotel attached to M. D. Anderson. It is a bit pricey, but very convenient. It has an attached walkway that goes straight into the hospital making it easy for Cheryl to go back and forth from my hospital room and a quiet night's sleep. At least that was the plan.

We got to the hospital a day early so we could get ready for surgery and have a final CT Scan before surgery. That and paperwork chewed up the entire day. I had a rough night worrying about losing my eye, so I did not sleep much. We headed into the surgery area around 5am and ended up in a bed where they got me wired up to the IV and did all the final paperwork. Cheryl was with me right up to the point where they wheeled me down the hall, then the lights went out.

Surgery

The surgery apparently took around 7 hours. Four for Dr. Lai to remove the cancer, and the rest for Dr. Yu to do the plastic surgery to get me ready for life with just one eye. I remember waking up and asking about the eye, and not being happy hearing the answer. That will take some time to adjust to.

Cheryl had to deal with this surgery on her own, which I was not happy about. It is hard waiting for reports, but she got a few, then talked to the doctors as they got done. I do not remember much about the initial recovery process, but I ended up in a normal room with two drainage tubes hooked up to my left leg, one for the new eye patch, and one for my leg scar. I also was being fed and given drugs by IV so I was pretty well tied down to the bed. I had a TV to while away the time, and Cheryl had a chair that actually made out into a twin bed that she used the first night after surgery so she could watch over me.

Recovery

The hospital routine was pretty normal. Check vitals every hour, especially the blood flow into the new skin patch around my eye. They watch that very closely to make sure the graft heals well. It could be a major mess if that goes wrong, but mine went fine. They also drained the plastic bulbs that catch fluid draining from the surgical wounds. Oh, yeah! They also kept my pain medicines coming on schedule. Actually the pain level for all of this was not so bad, so I was pretty comfortable.

They made me get out of bed the second day after surgery, and set me up with an exercise plan to get my leg moving again. I was able to walk very soon after surgery, and after one day with a nurse dragging the IV machinery around, they cleared Cheryl to do that for me. So, Cheryl and I started walking around the floor several times a day. Usually, I would end up sitting in the chair afterwards, so I was out of bed for several hours at a time.

I did not get much sleep since they kept waking me up every hour for some kind of system check. Cheryl would stay until around 9pm, then try to go back to the room to get some sleep before getting back to the room before doctors showed up aroung 6:30am. Unfortunately, it took her some time to work through messages or phone calls with friends and relatives, so she did not get much sleep either. It made for long days.

Small world

Around Wednesday evening, Cheryl decided to check my email to see if anything important was being missed. In the pile of messages was one from a high-school classmate I have not talked to for 50 years!. Clayton Baum's name rang a bell, but it turned out he too was a patient at M. D. Anderson, and was in Houston for a post-operation visit. What was stranger yet was that he too was here for the same kind of cancer I am fighting. We arranged for him to visit me in my room after his meetings on Thursday. The world got smaller when it turned out he had stayed in the room right next door to the room I was in, so he knew the way to my room with no problems.

We visited for about a half hour, compared surgical notes and caught up on how we had spent the last 50 years! Quite an amazing visit. We both agreed to try to get together at our 50th year reunion later this year back in D. C. Thanks, Clayton, for spending time visiting and I wish you well on your recovery.

Release

This all went on until Sunday morning. Then the nurse told us they were going to release us from the hospital that day! I admit that made me nervous, since I was having issues with swallowing and I was not sure we could eat well enough to go home. But we had been working with a dietician and a swallow expert and they were confident we could do it. It did take most of the day to get everything cleared up for release. They wheeled me to the front door while Cheryl retrieved the truck, and we were on our way back home!

Home

After a long fight with traffic, odd for a Sunday, we were back home, and I had to adjust to life at home. We are slowly getting into a routine with me eating a mostly liquid diet. Things are getting better, but there are still those moments where it all hits me, and Cheryl is having her share of those as well.

Things are getting better, but it is hard adjusting to this new life. I still have fears about the cancer, those will get better with time, but will not go away, so I will have to learn to live with them. Cheryl is slowly getting into a routine that lets here get some work done and still take care of me. These are hard days for both of us.

We both appreciate the prayers and messages from all those folks on our care team. It took me a few days before my eyes were working well enough to get this blog post together. Hopefully this will give those of you following our adventure a good update for now. Each day is a bit better than the day before, but we still have our ups and downs. We are trusting in God to help us through all of this, and we wish all of you nothing but the best as our way of thanking you for your support in all of this.

I will post again after we make our next trek to Houston.