The Princess treatment

I got a sign and a tiara!!! I showed everyone my sign who came in my room. Heh heh. Thanks again Chrystal and Shannon!! You are the best!

Back at home

The surgery went well. Doc said he got everything and now we are waiting to hear about the the pathlogy report. I hope it will be done Monday. I hope they won't make me wait until Wednesday whn tumor board discusses my case. That's a long time from now.

After surgery in recovery I was having a hard time getting my pain under control. The docs and nursers were trying everything to make me comfortable. I was finally put on phetnol. It helped for about 20 minutes and then wore off. My pain was still up at 9 or a 10. I have never been in that much pain from my surgeries. It scared me and I was laying there helpless. Once I was transfered to ICU the nice ladies there gave me a morphine pump that I could work myself every 10 minutes. That wasn't often enough so they lowered it to 7 minutes. Bless them! I was also put on Oxycodone. The pain was in check.

Shannon and Chrystal showed up with my Princess treatment sign and a tierra! They are great. The yummy torte and chocolate chip cookies weren't bad either. I'll blame the extra pounds on the steroids for sure. The night in ICU was uneventful thank goodness. I didn't even freak out that bad during my MRI. I usually need to be sedated for them after my surgeries. I think I feel like my head won't fit into the machine. I ended up staying in the hospital one more day than I usually do. The doc wanted me to be on antibiotics for another day - just in case. They are every worried about infection because this is my 5th time being opened up and I may not heal as quickly. He also wants my stitches to stay in for 6 weeks. I was planning to go back to work in 4. Not sure how that will work. I may just take the 2 extra weeks off. It mostly depends on what the pathology comes back and what the docs decide on for future treatment. I guess it will round the season off nicely. I can go back right after Thanksgiving.

We had visitors all weekend. My niece and nephew were getting worried about me so my sister in law brought them over to see me on Friday night a few hours after I got home. Maybe not the smartest thing but it was good to see them and I went to bed right after they left. My mom came over Saturday and cooked us all kinds of food. She even brought over more on Sunday. YUM! My dad came for dinner Sunday. Lot's of visits. Lot's of flowers, too. Love those!

I feel the love

In the past few days I have been treated to a pizza lunch, surprised by a goodie basket and was given a 1.5 hour massage gift certificate. I was so shocked every time! It really makes me feel good that all of these people think this way about me. I have so many friends that somehow it makes all this stuff I am going through easier. If I didn't have my coworkers to see every day I would not have been able to hang in there the last week. I will miss them all this next month. Then there is my friends. I can count on them to keep me company in my last hour. We are all dining together Monday night. Love you guys.

Thursday before

How is a person supposed to carry on with normal life with a surgery looming in the near future? I am getting worse today. Anxious. Nervous. I can't concentrate at work. Probably be better if I was at home. What would I do there? Look at my walls? I don't think anything would make it better. Well, maybe a trip to France for the weekend and a spa day the day before surgery. Now we're talking. But that's not going to happen. I'm looking forward to this weekend being around friends and family and then a group of friends are having dinner with me on Monday to keep me busy. Thanks girls.

Here it is:

The tumor is the white area. The black "void" is the area where the surgeons took out my first tumor all the way back in 2000. My brain never filled in the gap.

#5

Well, here I go again. Another surgery. It's been an emotional week. Last week Dr. M told me that he recommended Radiosurgery. A high dose of a medical procedure which allows non-invasive treatment of benign and malignant conditions. It's a high dose of radiation that would be applied to the new growth. It has many side effects - all that I was not shocked by. Seizures could intensify and there could be scar tissue that would cause problems itself. We went to see Dr. U on Tuesday and got all the information necessary to start the treatments. Wednesday a.m. I received a call from the surgeon's nurse requesting an appointment. WHAT? Ok my world was spinning. I couldn't hold it in anymore. I made my appointment for this morning and went to see Todd at work. I feel in a cloud. How is this happening again? Why is this happening to me again? Will it ever stop? DAMMIT!!!!

Today Todd and I went to see DR. E. He explained to me that surgery is the best option for the new growth. Surgery would allow a cleaner margin between brain and tumor than the Radiosurgery. Because of the area of the tumor it is less likely to cause problems. I have a tumor in a good area. That's the one thing I have going for me I guess. It's not moving to my brain stem or moving into the brain. BUT the damn thing keeps returning. I talked with Dr. M about future treatments. Whether they had discussed this in tumor board meeting. He said we have to wait for the pathology report to make that decision.

Surgery is tentatively set for October 14. I have a sinus infection I need to get rid of. Now I need to get referrals.