Surgery a total success today!

Well, we couldn't be happier than we are today! The purpose of the blog took a little bit of a hit yesterday when Allyson revealed to me that she had volunteered to be a part of WBTV's blog about breast cancer awareness. One of the anchors had heard about Allyson's story and reached out to her internally at work to see if she would be interested in being the subject of a blog that would track her progress.

Today started with Allyson, Linda, Erin and I heading to the hospital after dropping Avery off at school. We all got to be in the surgery prep room even though it was against the hospital rules to have more than one person in there with the patient. Luckily the floor supervisor took the day off, so the nurses cut us a break and allowed us all to go in with her, pray together and take some pictures. Allyson was definitely scared, but she was also in some high spirits before heading into surgery.

The blog story can be found here if you have not seen it already:

https://www.facebook.com/WBTVMollyGrantham/photos/a.284389134904910.88562.194220537255104/1073054426038373/?type=1&theater

You can see on Kathy Grantham's blog a very emotional Allyson before she goes in for surgery. It was hard to keep the camera steady as I watched it. My arms weren't long enough to tape it and hold on to her at the same time. That was frustrating!

The first part of the surgery today was to remove the breast tissue from both breasts...this is where they would also go in and test the sentinel nodes for each breast to finally determine whether any cancer had spread to the lymph nodes. This procedure took about an hour total, with the doctor joking that he could probably offer a discount to Allyson because he didn't have much tissue to remove ;). However, he also revealed that no spreading of the cancer was evident, and the die test that they did to test the nodes responsible for the affected areas of the tissue was very evident...so they knew they were testing the right nodes when they removed/tested them. Erin and Linda and I were so happy that we just wanted to hug on eachother. The hair on on the back of my neck was standing straight up as he gave us the good news! The wave of relief that washed over me was so strong that I felt like my knees just wanted to give out. It was a great moment!

Once Erin and Linda left to head home, I stayed in the waiting room and waited for the reconstruction portion of the surgery to get completed. This portion took much longer (about 2.5 hours), but again the doctor came out and explained that Allyson was a great patient and that the procedure was routine and flawless from her perspective. After another 90 minutes, I was finally able to see her as she came up to the room that she would stay in for the night. It was a long day, but well worth it now that we know the positive results.

We won't find out the rest of the pathology reports that reveal what the state of the original cancer is/was in her breast tissue until early next week.  These results will ultimately determine how Allyson will be treated from this point forward. If the cancer is still found to be alive and active, Allyson will likely have to leave the clinical trial she is in and go down the road of traditional standard of care for her cancer. This means losing hair, and getting much sicker as she has to deal with traditional chemo. However, if there is no sign of active cancer, then she will stay in the clinical trial and continue with the care that she's been receiving for 18 more cycles (once every three weeks). So we've still got some distance to cover, but the fact that we are focused on a much smaller area of her body means everything to us. The chances of remission are much higher now, and the chances of living a long and healthy life are much greater. Regardless of where she (we) go from here, the chance for a long and healthy life is vastly improved.

I'll certainly let everyone know how things go next week as soon as we hear more! For now...we are very happy, and very blessed to be part of such a loving community of family and friends. You would not believe the number of people that reached out to us to offer help in whatever way that they could. It was an incredible feeling of love and support.

For now, I'll leave you with a final picture of Allyson and I tonight...we are very happy with today's progress! We love you all!