Forgot to Mention . . .

When I saw my surgeon on Monday she had other news that I neglected to pass along. There was no evidence of the cancer having spread; so that means no chemo, no radiation. Just as planned, they extracted the entire stomach, the omentum and a few local lymph nodes. The only place the pathologist found cancer post-op, was a tiny little place in the stomach just where the endoscopy had detected signet ring cells back in the Spring. It dawned on me today that many people might be thinking that I'm facing the devastating standard cancer treatments many patients are forced to endure. Well, thank the lord, there's nothing of the sort needed. Are you kidding, I could never deal with that!

I knew prior to surgery that it was unlikely that the cancer had spread. The possibility certainly existed, but I chose not to entertain it. I apologize to any who may have been concerned about that aspect of my illness and surgery. It may have been nice to get a confirmation earlier than now. I don't mean to be so cavalier about it, I just hadn't been thinking along those lines at all.

In other news, I finally watched that episode of Grey's Anatomy that has a storyline of a family dealing with this condition. I'm a little ambivalent about it. On one hand, I almost got chills when I heard the words "Hereditary Diffuse Gastric Cancer" and "CDH1 gene mutation" uttered by characters on a major prime time hit network TV show (exposure, exposure, exposure) but then hearing all the inaccuracies kind gave me a sick feeling in the pit of my, um . . . small intestine? Well that doesn't exactly roll off the tongue now does it?

In any case, I recall my sister Rose addressing this in her blog so I will just steal her words when it comes to this show:

On the one hand, I think it’s great that a family dealing with HDGC was introduced on such a popular prime-time television
show. Undoubtedly, this exposure will help to raise awareness of this little-known and very rare syndrome. And they did an excellent job of
portraying some of the issues that such a family faces, such as

GRIEF and the loss of family members
FEAR and deciding whether or not to have the surgery
On the other hand, there were many factual errors, such as

-the surgeons felt a “mass” in Tricia’s stomach when they were taking it out — As you probably know, with diffuse stomach cancer, there is no MASS since the cells are scattered throughout the lining of the stomach.
-the doctors told the family that it was a “highly aggressive” form of cancer and that “tumors grow quickly” — No one knows how long my father had cancer in his stomach, but I’d be willing to bet that it was there, hiding, for YEARS before it was found (too late). This cancer is not “aggressive”… it is STEALTHY (and therefore, all the more deadly).
-they mention “dumping syndrome” but they don’t explain what it is
-the list of possible side effects and complications from prophylactic gastrectomy includes ANAL LEAKAGE — I have done a lot of reading about HDGC, and I don’t recall EVER hearing that anal leakage is a possible side effect of having your stomach removed!

And that's all I have to say about that!

First full day home presented some challenges. It's really hard to get in and out of bed without something to hold onto! Mom came over to help and was here all afternoon though. I think I'll feel better when all the edema finally subsides and I gain some flexibility back. Eating is a chore. This is all to be expected.
There are milestones in my head; one year being the best one, but it's so far away so I start to break it down. Four months will be good; two months I can probably go back to work, though I'm pretty sure my bar tending days are completely behind me. One month, the major effects of general surgery will be finished. Two weeks, I should have a lot of strength back. One week, I should be eating better. But for now, I'm almost finished with today, and that's a major accomplishment!