The Neurology Ward

So, dp is wearing a fashionable black eye patch today -- that way, there's only one of me (and everyone else).

Dr C was in first thing this morning, and said that surgical resection was definitely the best option. Apparently, it took until almost noon for the decision that there wouldn't be surgery today, because that's when the word came down that dp was allowed to eat again. She thought the onion rings sounded good, but changed her mind half-way through the second one -- Dr A came in about then, and said that while it was good that onion rings appealed to her, she should stick to a BRAT diet -- Broth, Rice, Applesauce and Toast. I guess her stomach is still pretty burned up from all the throwing up last week. She's on IV anti-emetics, but she's still having trouble keeping food down.

We also got a visit from radiation oncology -- not Dr. B, but one of his associates. He said they would probably want to do radiotherapy on dp's head not too long after surgery, and our eventual decision is whether to go with radiation focused on the tumor spot or "whole brain" radiation. The whole brain approach results in fewer future tumors, but it has more side effects (hearing and memory loss being the two that stuck in my head), and you can only do the whole brain thing one time. Our early thoughts are to go with the narrow beam.

Surgery could be Friday, but things are pretty chaotic over the holiday, so nobody's committing to anything today.

Let's see -- as the comments mentioned, Faith was here this morning, followed by Cinda, Marcy, Faith again, Dede, Dr. A, and Cinda again.

Despite it all, I think we're both in pretty good spirits - we spent the day yesterday dreading the phone call, but once it came, we were both ready to move ahead.

More news as we get it. Thanks for all the support and good thoughts.