Surgery Success! Posted by Elton

Jessica's surgery landed on Wed, September 28th and I couldn't have asked for a better birthday present.  She went into the OR at noon and at 2:45pm, I received a call from our surgeon (I say "our" because I had him perform on me once before) to tell me that the surgery went well without any complications.  The larger of the tumor was near a blood vessel that is very complicated and risky to remove but he managed to get it all out.  The second one was a little difficult for him to identify with the naked eye which tissue was malignant but he told me they use some kind of computer imaging during the procedure and was confident that he got it out too (which was confirmed by a CT scan this morning).  Jess remained in a standard holding recovery area for about 6 hours post surgery and is closed to people who are not patients and doctors.  Luckily our wonderful family doctor, Dr. Hutchinson got to see her and texted me the news that we were all concerned about - "saw her and able to talk well".  Knowing that the tumors were removed successfully without impairing her speech was a sigh of relief.  Seeing her at 8pm couldn't come soon enough.  I was expecting to see part of her head shaved and bandages wrapped around her head with blood on it and to my amazement, there was none.  She was very tired and drugged up by pain killers so I couldn't speak to her.  And with painkillers comes the side effects of nausea which is always the BIG problem for her - even with her last surgery.   She toughed it out as she normally does and by tonight, she was acting more or less like her old self.  Words can't express how grateful and thankful I am of her recovery in less than 24 hours!  Thank you Dr. Heran!

Having said that, there isn't much time to celebrate.  We need to get Jess at full strength again and get her on to the next treatment for her third brain tumor and the others in her body.  Thank you for all the supportive prayers, thoughts, e-mails and texts we have received in the last 3 days!  It's been a roller coaster of emotions with having the surgery postponed but at the end, it was all worth it!