A Surprise Surgery

Nov. 21

Shockingly, Fred ended up having surgery today. Dr. A called us last night to tell us he needed to do a biopsy under anesthesia and to reduce the bulk of the tumor. Fred went in at 12:30 and came out at 6:00 pm and ended up admitted to the hospital unexpectedly.

During surgery, Dr. A did two frozen sections of the tumor that came back non-diagnostic. He told me that he knew there was something wrong with Fred and so he didn’t believe the biopsy results. He decided to take a large chunk of the tumor (which by today was so large it was occluding his airway and causing him to choke and aspirate). I freaked out when I looked in Fred’s mouth and actually saw it. During all our visits to all the doctors, I could never see the tumor, but it has grown so fast that it is huge now and very obvious to see. When Dr. A took out the mass; he described it as an enormous “peanut M&M” with normal tissue surrounding the cancer cells. When the mass was sent for frozen section it was positive for squamous cell carcinoma.

We asked Dr. A to place the PEG tube and a port while Fred was under anesthesia so that he only had to have one exposure to anesthetic. I was thankful that he did that for us, but when Fred woke up, he had a sore throat, a sore chest and a sore abdomen.

The first post-operative problem we encountered was Fred’s inability to urinate. A catheterization in the OR combined with anesthetic and narcotics caused urinary retention. With lots of patience and time, he finally voided, but it was very painful.

The next problem was the pain at the PEG tube site. He complained of that from the first time I saw him post-op. Finally, the night nurse decided to check the wound and started taking off the tape. Fred immediately gave a huge sigh of relief. When the tape came off, so did his blistered skin. Wherever the tape was, he blistered. So he had blisters around the new PEG tube and where his port was placed.

The next problem was pain relief. One of the nurses decided to give him oral pain pills. His new PEG tube was open to gravity drainage, and out went the medication into the bag – thus no relief. We convinced her to give him IV meds and oral meds at the same time, and then to clamp the bag for at least an hour after giving the oral meds. This finally brought him some relief and he got a few snippets of sleep.

I stayed with Fred the entire time. There is NO WAY I was going to let him be unattended in today’s healthcare system! I still can’t believe he has cancer. Denial is the only way I am getting through this. Melissa stayed with me through it all, bless her heart! I couldn’t have made it without her! Jon called me about every hour and I tried to keep him up-to-date. I know he would have been here if he could have been. I have the best kids in the world!

K