Out of the Hospital

Brain surgery is not for the faint of heart!  What did they do for 10 hours?  I understand that the first two hours were to position me on the table.  Intubation speaks for itself.  Staff tape the eyes shut to prevent against corneal scratching.  The gooey stuff all over my head suggests that I must have resembled a mummy when they secured me to a table in an intentionally dark and cold room.  The doctors manipulate the tools, specially designed for this kind of surgery, through monitors.  First they break into the sinus cavity.  Next they snake around the cavity to the bottom of the skull where they drill a small whole to access to brain base, where brain, nerves, carotid artery and spinal cord meet in something of ground zero of the entire nervous system.  Then they begin the task for which they made all of these preparations.

Doctor Prevedello told me that they saw a hard white core as they approached the nerve.  The tumor was not a schwannoma after all, but a fibrous mass that has grown within the nerve itself.  A schwannoma would have been preferred.  As a tumor of the nerve sheath, it is usually made out of a material that the surgeons find easy to remove and it does not have to involve the nerve specifically.  This tumor does, and will.  Had they cut out the tumor completely they would have severed the nerve.  In order to preserve what they could they cut out the white core and left the surrounding area.   It is even more rare than a schwannona, and there is no known cause.  

Recovery has not been easy.   First there was the breathing.  I woke up in the recovery room, I kid you not, to the following statement:  "The computers are down."  Good God!  Breathing difficulties quickly overwhelmed my humored sense of coincidental irony.   A nurse attempted to place a thick floppy plastic mask over my mouth after I heard one say that my oxygen level was low.   The mask made me feel like was truly going to suffocate.  Not only did the endoscopic approach require a complete packing of my nose and the extubation swelling of my throat, but I could feel a bunch of glop down there.  I fought off the mask but could not get them to understand I needed help to sit up.  I began repeating firmly: take me to the room.  I knew that once I got upstairs either a nurse would help me or I could communicate to Denise who could get some water and a basin.  It is now the first thing I remember in the CCU unit.  I swished the water around and sure enough ...

Second was eating.  Breathing through my mouth was such a chore I could not imagine taking precious seconds away from that process to chew and swallow.  Well, just swallow, because while I worked through the eating exercise with soft foods, the pain in the right side of my face, including teeth and gums, makes chewing unthinkable.  Pain management is my third struggle. What used to be numbness is now wildly sensitive, although in most places a numbness lies beneath that sensitivity.   While I still believe I made the right choice about the procedure, it is also true that this approach compounds facial pain.  Once I had enough food in my stomach to accept the opiate type of drugs without threat of nausea, I have taken them gladly.

Now for the good news:  I have the loving care of my family and friends!  Every single communication has meant the world to me.  Denise has told me about posts, e-mails and calls over the weekend from dear friends in Ithaca and Denise's parents in Oklahoma and having just read them all now has lifted my spirits tremendously.   I feel so very fortunate to have made genuine relationships with wonderful people, including my student Ben, over these last seven years of work.  These friendships in Ithaca and around the country are the best part of the job! I am blessed with a loving family spread across the United States from Hawaii, California, Texas (thanks for calling, Audrey!), Illinois, and of course Rochester, Angel Nardone especially, and the East Coast, and friends who are like family, the Swensens, who took Sammy, and the Guiliani's, who took Nikko over the weekend into their hearts and homes.  I cannot tell you how much it means to me to know that in addition to Bill they have the warm embrace of your families to comfort them.  And after I click on "Publish Post" I am going to give Denise the most appreciative hug in the world!

Denise tells me that the ENT just called to say that I can go tomorrow to get the packing out of my nose.  I believe the stents remain in a for a few more weeks but the prospect of breathing through my nose again feels liberating.  And hopeful.  Without an emergency, you wouldn't go into this surgery if you knew how difficult the first 72 hours of it would be.  But with the help of my friends I am already looking out towards the other end.  Blessed are those who give comfort.  However you count your blessings, secular or beyond, I wish you that kind of day.

Love, and thank you, to you all.