Michael's doing well...

Michael's surgery went okay on Friday. It was supposed to take an hour from start to finish but it was well over 2 hours later when the surgeon came out to tell us Michael was fine and on his way to recovery.

We had a little disagreement with the anesthesiologist right before the surgery. She insisted on using the anesthesia drug that Michael previously had a reaction to. She claimed she had "no other choices", which we know is not true since they give him a different kind in Rochester. In the end, she promised that she had another drug that she would give Michael that would counteract the anesthesia and he would have no reaction. So, we put our trust in her and reluctantly agreed.

When it took so long in the operating room, my mind was running wild with things that had gone wrong with the anesthesia and envisioned them afraid to let us see him. But that wasn't it. Apparently his port was stuck and they had to "bring up a special machine" to help them get it out. But they did remove it and Michael was finally resting comfortably in recovery. The nurses had told us we absolutely couldn't keep the port but the surgeon said we could and in the end, he brought it out to us. It is now on a shelf in Michael's room.

Michael was starving when he finally woke up from surgery and ate like a crazy man over the next couple of hours. Unfortunately, he didn't keep any of it down. The good news is that we still carry all of our nausea paraphernalia from chemo in the car so it wasn't a big problem. We stopped on the side of the road and cleaned things up with some snow and then Michael slept the rest of the way home. He felt much better by the time we got home.

Michael had quite a bit of discoloration from the blood pooling under his skin but that is pretty much all gone now. He had some pain Saturday and Sunday but hates taking medicine so he just tolerated it and he's now pretty much pain free. He was pretty quiet and favored his right arm over the weekend but isn't doing that so much anymore. The only left to do is wait for the stitches to dissolve (which should take up to 2 weeks).

I am glad this is all behind us because Michael had a VERY rough couple of weeks. He was difficult, overly emotional and - well - totally obnoxious. It was so out of character for him and I was hoping it was anxiety over the upcoming surgery. When I would ask him what was wrong, he would tell me he just couldn't explain what he was feeling. Since he woke up in the recovery room with a smile on his face, he is back to being my sweet, adorable little boy and I am immensely relieved.

The next stop in our journey is an MRI next month in Syracuse. I will try to post some pictures I would like to share in the next couple of days. But as I said last time, I am working on a different computer so I have to transfer the pictures onto this one (which involves a learning curve since it is different software). In the meantime, please keep Michael in your thoughts and prayers, JoAnne.

It's been a while ...

It's been a while since I posted. My laptop has been very ill with a nasty virus and we are redecorating our den so my desktop is not very comfortable to work on right now.

When I posted last, we were getting ready for Michael's latest MRI. I am thrilled to say that it was spectacular. To Dr. Korones's amazement, it looked like the tumor shrunk a little more. At the very least, there was still no active growth. Jeff made a comment that we were really nervous before the MRI and Dr. Korones was honestly puzzled as to why. We told him that we figured that the farther away we get from chemo, the more likely it was that there would be some growth. He said actually the opposite was true. The farther out we go, the less likely that the tumor would to start growing again. That was wonderful to hear. We also talked to him and he supported our decision to start having Michael's MRI's done in Syracuse. I took some comfort in that because I feel if he thought Michael was in any danger, he would want us to continue going to Rochester.

We are heading to Syracuse tomorrow for our first appointment there since switching away from Rochester. Michael is scheduled to have his port-a-cath removed at 11 am. If there are no problems with the anesthesia, it should be a simple procedure and we should be out of there early. We told Michael if he feels well enough, we will stop at Toys-R-Us on the way home so he can use a gift card he received for Christmas. Keep your fingers crossed that everything goes smoothly.

I will post again tomorrow night to let everyone know how he made out. Please keep Michael in your thoughts and prayers, JoAnne.