Healthward

DAY ONE

Hi everyone,

This is the first in a series of daily updates about the love of my life - my wife Barbara. She was diagnosed with a tumor at 2 p.m., Thursday, September 4th, 2009, and by 11 p.m. that evening. Her surgeon told me that he removed 99.9% of the cancer that he found on her ovaries. Now, five days later, we are realizing - again - the amazing and incredible amount of love that her family, friends, and colleagues have for her.

This Blog is for all of you.

We are just learning about this new challenge and we want to keep it simple and manageable. We also hope that in some way, our journey can be one that heals us and gives others the peace that comes from knowing your loved one is all right.

The doctors have said that attitude is at least as important as all of the medical support. There is really only one attitude to have - we will fight this and win.

Today is a great day! Barb is getting her hair washed for the first time in 6 days - and we can all imagine how freeing and relieving that can be! The other good news is that Dr. Morissey's partner, Dr. McElrath, gave her permission to get up and walk around today. This is very important to the healing process - if she can walk, eat solid food, and a few other things, then that is enough to get her discharged from her "dungeon" (she hates her room - even though it is the only private one on the floor!) and home again. It's also important because it means the heparin drip is working and her blood levels are "therapeutic." You see, we had a little setback a few days ago - Barb was having trouble breathing which initiated another CT scan, which turned up two bloodclots - one in each lung. This is typical for a person who has undergone major surgery, and especially for someone who has some type of cancer. But for now, those two clots are on their way out, and we are all looking forward to getting Barb home as soon as possible!

With love and respect,

Dave and Barb