Saturday 14 February 2009

Valentine's Day! Fifty quid for a rose anyone? (just call me Mr Cynical!)

Quite an eventful day today - surgeon came round and ordered my staples to be removed in the neck wound (not the main wound yet though) and the Central Catheter to be removed from my neck as well (infection risk apparently). All this happened pretty quickly this morning. I now have my morphine, paracetemol and saline into a normal canular in the back of my left hand.

In the period in between disconnecting the neck line and reconnecting the hand line, I was able to go to the bathoom and have a decent wash. Quite nice, but it did tire me out quite quickly.

I've had a welcome influx of visitors again today - Dave and Matt and Martin and later Colin, Nova and Livia which was really nice and helped the day go quickly. I'm nicely relaxed now and will sleep well tonight!

So, on to the saga of the Pesky Nodule then ...

The great news is that while the surgeon was inside, he managed to find the "invisible" nodule and it was luckily in a postion that he could remove it along with the main tumour. The possible bad news is that the nodule did appear to be cancerous. This means that either this was a second primary tumour, or the main tumour has showm the ability to spread. If it is the latter, although there are no other signs of spread, the process may have started in other areas, yet to materialise.

The next step is that the tumour and surrounding material removed during the op has been sent away for analysis ("histology"). This will show a number of things: how the tumour is formed - are there cancerous cells on the "margins" for instance, which helps to indicate whether the tumour was ready to spread - and how the tumour responded to the chemotherapy. This all helps to determine if there is any post-operative treatment they should do (post-surgery chemo cycles are quite common, as is post-surgery radiotherapy). I should find out the situation in a couple of weeks, and whether they plan any further treatment. Not sure the implications of any of this yet - it may just be belt and braces, or it may be more serious. Nothing for me to worry about in the short-term anyway!

The other story I promised you involves the epidural that was fitted before the surgery. The anaesthetist told me that he had to fit the epidural after I was asleep in the end, as it was really hard to get in (I only have small gaps between my vertebrae apparently - you learn something new about yourself every day!). He was describing and apologising for the pain and discomfort that he caused me whilst trying to fit it. The amazing thing is that although I was awake and compos mentis during this period, I have absolutely no recollection of it. My mind has obviously extended the period of the surgery to completely blank out the pain and discomfort of the epidural as well! You won't hear me complaining though! Worst part of all of this is that the epidural fell out on Tuesday anyway, so it wasn't worth the fuss!

Anyway, enough rambling - time for a kip!

Remind me to tell you tomorrow about the diet guidance I got from the nutritionist - it's great news!

Cheers Ears,

C x