Home!

It's over! I'm back from surgery.

Today was the first day I felt like a cancer patient. Sitting in a wheelchair while an elderly man had to push me from department to department....a sympathetic nurse let me walk for a bit but mostly I had to ride. The cocoon of warm blankets was wonderful but I'd have rather moved about under my own steam,even with my naked butt hanging out of my gown.

The wire placement wasn't a big deal until the last one, which hurt like hell. I admit to yelping when I got stuck with that barbed wire through the boob. Dr U was very nice about it and shot me up with more Lidocaine to finish the procedure. Then, with four wires protruding from my boob I proceeded to the mammo room where the wires were taped to my skin and my girl posed for a new photo shoot.

Then came the waiting. Over three hours of just.....waiting. One of the nice things about not sleeping much is that I was very drowsy there in my nest of warm blankets. I was able to doze a bit, which helped to pass the time. My mom was there, and Walker. My sister stopped by for a while, and my brother was there when I woke up. I was grateful for the company.

Finally I was taken to the surgical floor, where the anesthesiologist told me I would not be "asleep" for the procedure. He told me I'd be so out of it I wouldn't feel a thing, but that they would be talking to me during the whole procedure , and I would be able to respond. He gave me an anti-nausea patch along with a shot of Benedryl before he went on his way. I am very, very glad I didn't know ahead of time that I wouldn't get general anesthesia. Not sure how I'd have handled that but I'm guessing, not well.

A few minutes later Dr C came in for a final check with me and we were on our way. I don't actually remember much after going into the surgery room: a couple nurses introduced themselves, an anesthetist told me she would be starting sedation, and I slid over onto the operating table. The nurses started strapping things to my body. Then I *woke* in recovery.

And I woke to lots of encouraging news: Dr C was able to remove all four tumors along with the two sentinel nodes in one incision. I don't have a drain. The initial dissection of the sentinel nodes didn't indicate cancer. I get the final path report on Tuesday.

I was released about two hours later. Thanks to my new friend Janine, I had brought along a pillow for the car. Thank you, Janine! I definitely didn't want to strap that seat belt over my sore boob. We went through the pharmacy drive-thru for my pain meds but so far, I haven't needed any. I do have an ice pack wrapped in a dishtowel under my sweatshirt.

I ate PB&J for supper, and Walker mixed up some munchies for the Survivor debut tonight. All things considered, today was a great day.