The Scan Was Wrong

The night before surgery a little request to our surgeon...

Dr. Pappas,

Thank you again for everything you have done for Tony and believe it or not our family these past 5 years.  Its time for another miracle.  I will be praying for you and your team tomorrow.  If we have to do this every 5 years I'll take it.  Please do everything you can tomorrow to help Tony!!  Please save him again!!

All my best!!

These boys deserve a father to watch them grow up...report time was 8am.  A prayer with Pastor Sammy and his wife, a visit with my mom, and a last minute visit with Frank, Tony's childhood best friend, I kissed him good bye as they rolled him into surgery.  The tears were few this time.  I had been through this before, I knew what to do.  The best part...I wasn't alone this time.  I didn't have to watch the clock tick, tick, tick...instead I had conversation to keep me occupied.  I didn't have a quiet brain of thinking, instead I had prayer and hope rushing through my head and heart. 

Exactly 1 hour after surgery started, I went up to the desk and asked the lady (a familiar face from 5 years before) to call back to the OR and ask for an update.  She revealed they were continuing on with surgery, and making the incision now.  Happy and relieved, I walked back to the group and shared the good news.  Now it was another 2 hour wait.  What would be next?  Instead I decided to give the good news to Alec that surgery was continuing.  He must have been watching the clock because he called me just 10 min before for an update. :)

Three hours later, my pager went off.  Dr. Pappas was ready to see me.  I went into the room by myself and sat down on the couch.  I watched the clock, just as I started counting, Dr. Pappas walks in the door and tells me everything went well...He calming tells me what all he had to do, and what the cancer had done, and what was next.  He told me this was good news and I needed to get myself together because I would be the first person he would see when he woke up.  This is as good as it gets.

I walked back out to the group, trying to keep my emotions contained.  Happiness, Fear, Anxiety....all in one.

"Dr. Pappas did it again!!!" I announced

Knowing that any other surgeon would've closed Tony up, I was even more emotional.  Why all this if the tumor was only in his colon?  IT WASN'T.  When the doctor got in there, the tumor was growing through his spleen, pancreas, and colon...the scan was wrong.  :(  Thank God though because they continued with surgery.  First the colon in chunks to get back to the pancreas and spleen.  Bye Bye spleen, bye bye tail of pancreas and bye bye 23 cm of colon.

My love, my best friend, my soul mate has a long recovery ahead.  But he's still here, he will continue to fight.  I have some good news for my babies!!!

Thank God for answered prayers.