Dessert

Dr. Collins just came in at 4:45 pm. Because of the radiation and past surgery scaring it was a very hard surgery. He sat down and looked exhausted. He wanted to know how we were (I think that we looked exhausted!). I asked him how he was - he looked worse than us. He kind of freaked us out, actually.

The first thing out of his mouth was, "It was a difficult case and he lost a lot of blood."

One of the fears was that the spot by the heart was cancer. Dr. Collins found that it was not. He said that Mother Nature gave him a scare. The bronchial tube had adhered to his chest wall (from the scaring, maybe?). So the good news is, what we thought was cancer in that spot, is not.

He took a bunch of nodules out that looked benign and sent them to pathology - they look atypical likely due to the radiation (thanks a lot, Tarali!).

The middle lobe was removed along with the nasty cancer (which looks contained). Last time, it was it was protruding out out of his lower lobe.

He took a sampling of the upper bronchial tree and at first look, it looks cancer free. YAY!!!

Rob and I had a difficult time deciding whether to have the surgery at LDS Hospital or here at Intermountain Medical Center. Dr. Collins said that it really was a good thing that it was done here. He had to use some instrumentation that is not available at LDSH. In fact, he had to pull some tools from his cardiac kit during the operation.

We tried to ask Dr. Collins about how long he would be in the ICU. He said that we are not allowed to ask questions that begin with "how long or what if." That was just the bit of comic relief that we needed.

We will receive a full path report in two to three days to confirm everything.

All I can say is that I am so grateful for modern medicine and prayers (miracles do happen). This is what we were praying for.

Noah (six) has been very worried that I would have to find him a new Daddy. Good thing that I don't have to do that yet. Tarali still wants me to find a new uncle (for him). : )

There are still a lot of unanswered questions. (Keep praying, please!)

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They called us about 15 minutes ago to let us go back and see him.

Ironically, when we walked in, the television was on. The program was "House." Tarali asked Rob, "You didn't get enough of the operating room, you have to watch it here?"

My Mom followed with: "That's in case they got the diagnosis wrong." You know how smart that Dr. House is (the drug addict doctor!)!

He looks so good. (Last time, he was gray and really out of it.) He was pink and responsive and in no pain! He was able to talk and answer questions. Our family will be taking turns over the next few days to visit him during his 'vacation' in the ICU.