Part One Down

Sorry it has taken me so long to get a status out, but it has been a little bit of a hectic weekend. Bobbie had her surgery on Friday at 3pm. The estimated 2 hours and 20 minutes for the surgery, but were done in just under 2 hours. They removed a tumor from just under her jaw line on the right side of her neck. The surgeon felt comfortable that they pretty much got all of it, but she will still need to follow-up with systemic therapy with Interferon, as we already expected. They kept her overnight at the hospital and I stayed with her.

The incision was very clean, unlike the garbled mess from last time - in terms of how it looked immediately following the surgery and for a few days after, and she looked great when I first saw her. The only negative is that during the surgery there was apparently some nerve damage to a nerve that runs along your jaw line (can't remember the name of it). The impact is that the muscles in the right half of her bottom lip don't work. So, it makes it hard for her to eat and such at the moment, but her speech appears to be unaffected. We have no idea on the permanence of this condition. She will need to contact the surgeon on Monday to setup an appointment to discuss the condition and her options. My guess is that they will be A) tough luck, that happens sometimes, B) she will need physical therapy to help the nerve repair itself or C) she will need an additional surgery to attempt to repair the nerve. The surgeon that assisted in the surgery that met with us at the hospital the next day said that it is possible that it will repair itself if it was just injured or that if it were severed that her primary surgeon would need to decide the course of action. She is obviously bothered by this quite a bit since it affects her ability to eat, smile, etc. So, hopefully it will be a relatively easy fix. It doesn't bother me in the slightest other than the fact that she is bothered by it.

She is in a little pain today at the incision, but her primary complaint is a sore throat from the breathing tube that was in place during the surgery. It hurts for her to swallow. She chose not to take any narcotic medication and is making do with a mix of Acetaminophen and Ibuprofen every three hours. She's been sleeping quite a bit at the house, but that is expected after regularly interrupted hospital sleep along with the body recovering from the surgery.

Of course, the big takeaway here is that the tumor was seemingly successfully removed and Bobbie is out of surgery safely. We certainly have plenty of challenges ahead with her preventative treatment and who knows what with the nerve damage, but if it all means that she will be around for years to come, it is certainly worth it. I think Killian would agree.