Bye Bye Tumor

Yesterday was game day. Dressed in my finest Columbia Athletics gear I was pumped to go and have my tumor out. Ate some orange jello around 7:30 am and then drank water until 9 am, but wasn't allowed anything after. Not the best pre-game meal, but it was my only option.  Checked into the hospital around 10:35 am. Was moved into the PACU (post anesthesia care unit, or as my father and I dubbed it the Warm Up/Cool Down area) to get an IV placed and heart monitor, oxygen monitor and blood pressure cuff attached. The surgeon game in and identified which side he was working on and where the lump is. Yup, yet another day with Yes written in sharpie on my boob.

Glowing in the Dark 
Then at 12:00 pm I was sent down to radiology to have the lymph channels injected with a radioactive material (very surprised I don't glow in the dark). The radiologist was the same who had done the original biopsy, so we chatted as she injected me with the burning substance. The ChemE in me insisted on knowing what the element was, and it is Technetium.  Then it was back to the PACU for the wait for surgery. I insisted that my hospital issued slippers given the amount of radiation I've had should be Spiderman, but my father thinks they should have been Incredible Hulk. My mother just shook her head at both of us.

Game Time
The anesthesiologist came in around 1:30 pm and injected some versed (the sleep inducing drug) and they wheeled me to the OR. The last thing I remember is looking at the lights in the OR amazed by how many individual light bulbs where in the lamps. Apparently the surgeon then did his thing. Thankfully, the technetium found the two Sentinel Lymph Node and I got to keep the rest of my lymph nodes.

Post Game
When I woke up in the cool down area I had some burning in my armpit (node biopsy) and the lovely Irish nurse gave me some good pain medicine. I then went back to sleep. The surgeon came in to talk to me, but I was a bit loopy so he went to the waiting room to give my parents the rundown. Two incisions; one for tumor removal and one for node biopsy (cosmetically better allegedly). He took out the tumor plus the area around the tumor called a margin. Everything removed gets tested (come on clean margins!) to make sure it is all out.  So we'll wait another week to find out if everything is out and if the cancer is in the lymph nodes.

I finally was awake enough at 4:30 pm to go home. Anesthesia made me a little nauseous and driving home felt like we were going 1000 mph. I had a couple of spoonfuls of soup and some pain medicine and since then I have just been icing and napping.

Peeing Blue
Thank goodness the surgeon gave me a heads up about this side effect. In order for him to get the correct lymph nodes he injects you with blue dye and you pee blue. (And it is much darker than the photo below. I felt the need to call my parents in to see it before I flushed. Below is the color I am currently dispensing. Image source). And please don't claim this is TMI, this whole blog is TMI.

Currently I feel a little like this (see around the 1:30 mark):

Appetite has returned this morning and just stuffed myself with blueberry pancakes. Will be making sure I am eating to heal!