Friday, May 1, 2009

Surgery schedule

My surgery is scheduled for Friday, May 15th at Banner Estrella Hospital. The liver transplant surgeon will come to Estrella vs. us having to over to Good Sam Hospital. Estrella is a lot closer to home for me anyways. That will complete six full weeks off of chemo. I am very pleased to wait for the six week mark. They will take 1/3 of my colon and the surrounding lymph nodes. They will also be taking the right lobe of my liver which is about 60%. The reason for this is my liver was so bad when we started off and leaving any scar tissue from the tumors will only give the cancer a great area to come back. Therefore, they want to take any remains of cancer out of my body. Removing any and all cancer is totally fine with me. I will be in the hospital for at least 5-7 days after surgery. Then home to finish my 4+ week recovery. Deron will be updating my blog for me hopefully on a daily basis to keep you all posted on the post op recovery. I'm very excited and also a bit nervous. I was not planning on the liver resection but I fully understand their reasoning. I now have to make my "to do" list of everything I want to get completed before surgery. Please say a few prayers for my surgeons to have great knowledge and steady hands. Also say a prayer for my family and my speedy recovery. This was our major goal when I was diagnosed almost 7 months ago. I think I am still a bit in shock that my body has come so far in the last 7 months. God has been so good to me.
Hope all is well with everyone else.
Much love,
Kim

4 comments:

Jill said...

So glad you have a date. Many prayers headed your way for a speedy recovery! God is good :)

Anonymous said...

Will definitely be thinking of you during the next couple of weeks. I will be praying for you, your family, and your medical staff. You are such an inspiration. Keep the faith - I am so proud to consider you a fellow survivor, and I can't wait to meet you in person, again. Maybe this time I will remember you!!! (Chemo brain is an amazingly frustrating thing!)

Carol said...

Hi Kim, My name is Carol and I too have battled that colon cancer monster. I have been watching your blog since I saw the article in the newspaper a while back. I am so glad that you are doing well and want to offer words of encouragement for your upcoming surgery.
I am 2.5 years post surgery for Stage III and so far am NED! I was 45 when dx'd and it was a total SHOCK. I did not have any symptoms except a bit of bleeding from time to time which I thought was the hems flairing up. Good thing I have an awesome PCP who made me go to the GI!
Anyway, I want to let you know that my surgery was not too bad. Just make sure they give you a diaper as it was not a lot of fun running for the bathroom when you can't! They attached a ball of medicine to my incision area and that really took care of the pain.
I was out of the hospital in 5 days and it took a few weeks after that to get moving around again but overall not too bad.
I also gave your blog address to someone I know who was dx'd 25 years ago (YES...25 YEARS!) with Stage IV...so I hope she sends you some words of encouragement as well.
Take care of yourself and I wish you and your family the very best.

Jen Bartee said...

Our family continues to pray for all of you! We will keep you in our thoughts and keep the prayers coming!