The alarm went off at 5:30 this morning, after not quite enough sleep. Lynda was on no-fluids-whatsoever since midnight (and no food for two days) so I felt bad gulping down a cup of tea in front of her before we left.
We arrived promptly at 7:00 am, as scheduled, and were passed from hand to hand, room to room, answering similar questions multiple times (which is somehow both annoying and reassuring). I finally had to leave her in the clutches, er, care of the system by about 8:50, 10 minutes before the surgery was due to start.
It was close to 1pm before I got word in the waiting room that she had left recovery and was in her room, and had the doctor been to speak to me? Ah, no, he had not. After waiting the suggested 10 more minutes (5 minutes really, I was anxious by now) I raced off to find her room, but nobody was around at first who could tell me what her room number was -- so I stalked the halls like a madman until someone pointed me to her room. Then of course they "weren't quite ready for me yet" so I had to cool my jets in the waiting room again for 10 minutes.
Ya, ya, poor me, what about Lynda?
Well, I was pre-visualizing the worst, and was therefore pleased that she looked not bad at all, lovely as ever in fact. I'd have married her all over again at that moment. It was very very good to see her.
The surgeon stopped by later (actually I met him in the corridor, not sure he was even headed to our room) - apologized for not letting me know how it went -- he apparently forgot.
How it went, he says now, was great. The MRI and the pathology suggested -- and the surgery confirmed -- that it was a different "type" of tumour than they thought, a type which is less inclined to spread beyond the uterus. And indeed it did seem confined to within the uterus, though very large. Along with the uterus, lymph nodes in the area were also removed -- these looked okay, but will need to be studied, as will some other bits they took out, to help determine if there was any spread of the cancer.
This post-op pathology wil determine whether radiation is needed. We won't know that for at least three weeks, and she would be sufficiently recovered from the surgery for at least three weeks, so we'll cross that bridge down the river, as it were. My feeling is that radiation is still likely, but a little less likely than we thought before.
Lynda was deeply asleep when I left her this evening, had been for an hour or so, and hopefully will be through the night. Prior to that she was responsive, coherent, and did I mention lovely? But very very weak and in a fair bit of pain. She has a little button she can press to dispense her own morphine, a small dose every five minutes at most. She said it was all she could do to just press the button. I gave her ice chips (all she was allowed for now) at frequent intervals; she would swim up into consciousness and sink down again fairly regularly.
She has a phone if she feels up to calling out, but I don't expect that will happen until at least late tomorrow or perhaps Sunday. I don't expect she'll be up to visitors either, unless her stay becomes more protracted than we expect, as her strength recovers.
I'll be back in to see her tomorrow (Saturday), and will post any new developments here.
Bob.