Doctor Wilson Said, it was “Reet-Petite”

It really is fascinating to watch this whole recovering thing, from my perspective. That’s not to say I’m enjoying every bit of it. Obviously from my rather grumpy last post, there are moments or even days I could do without. But since I’ve been in fairly good health all of my life, I expect a certain response from my body when I challenge it with different scenarios.

For example, if I say “Body, you’re going to spend a good amount of time helping your son with his homework today,” I would expect my body to reply with, “No prob, Dave. Piece of cake. Maybe later we can do about 20 other things before calling it a night. Glass of wine sounds good, too.” To which I would reply, “Body, you rock. Excellent idea.”

But, no. When I challenged my body with that exact scenario yesterday, as I was feeling MUCH better than the previous day and it seemed that working on a 2nd grade research project should be a breeze, my body silently took on the challenge. We took a few breaks, but over the course of the day, we finished the project, obviously intended to be done over the course of many evenings, in just one day. And when all was said and done, my body said, “BITE ME, TUMOR BOY! THANK YOU, AND GOOD NIGHT!” I passed out so hard in my La-Z-Boy I’m surprised I even found it a good idea to climb into bed hours later. It was as if I had spent the day chopping wood, wrestling rabid badgers, running in 4 different 5k’s and teaching a Sweatin’ to the Oldies class.

Today was the long anticipated follow-up with Dr. Wilson, the be-bowtied (it’s a new word – I made it up – roll with it) neurosurgeon. I had carefully typed up my list of questions again, and brought Terry in with me to make sure I didn’t miss anything. He was obviously not worried about a thing, as the visit was quick and light. But thanks to my written list of questions, I was able to find out quite a few things.

Official report: tumor was benign. Woo-hoo! Seriously, I don’t know if I would have found out if I hadn’t asked. I think he was so convinced in the first place that this was the case that it was almost a non-issue in his mind. In about another month I have to go back for another MRI to check and make sure that it’s all gone. I asked about the possibility of it ever coming back, and he said maybe about 15%. I’ll take those odds.

He said that by now my vision is probably as improved as it’s going to get. There is still some obvious damage to the optic nerve as demonstrated by the old shine-a-penlight-at-each-eye trick. The left pupil does a better job contracting than the right one does. But, when I covered my left eye and he held up a magazine a couple feet from my face, I was able to easily read the words. That, my friends, is a definite improvement from before the surgery. So where it may be a little disappointing that my right eye is never going to be back to normal, I am very satisfied with the level of improvement.

I asked him about this odd issue with my gut, where it feels bruised on the inside in one spot, and he theorized that on top of the old system-out-of-whack-from-the-anesthesia theory, he said it was even possibly that someone was leaning on me there during surgery. Picture that – probably an intern. Everyone’s up at my head doing all the cutting, and some nerdy guy has kicked his feet up, planted his elbows on my gut (after all, it is quite cushy) and with face in hands he’s going “oh, wowwwwww. Coooooooooooooool…” And maybe eating popcorn.

As far as some other issues, it looks like I have to wait another 1 – 2 months before everything stops smelling like bread pudding, or for my sinuses to really clear out back to normal, or even for all of the sensation to return to my lip, palette and upper teeth. And although I can start doing some cardio or light toning workouts as soon as this week, no serious weight workouts for another month. As if I needed an excuse.

And of course, he said that I could probably get back to work later this week if I so desired, but consider a half day for the first few times. Knowing my body’s newfound ability to shut down into rest mode in quite the confrontational way, that sounds like a good plan to me.

I had also asked for the size of the tumor, and he didn’t have that exact information in front of him. You know, I was looking for something in millimeters, something concrete. But he repeated what he told me in the hospital: it was about the size of a small hen’s egg, putting his finger and thumb together to visually represent that concept.

Let’s put this into perspective, shall we? A big, globulous blob was growing on this gland that dangles under my brain and was the size of a small egg. I imagine that the human head doesn’t really come with convenient storage compartments, or stow-n-go brain seating. So all the pieces and parts inside, like my optic nerve, for instance, had to be pushed and shoved out of the way to make room for Raoul the non-functioning pituitary adenoma. It’s a wonder my eyes weren’t popping out of my skull or something. Like that strange squeeze alien thing that you could always find at Spencer Gifts.

Spent the rest of the afternoon getting Mom to the doctor’s office, just to make sure we double checked that whole passing out in the ICU thing. All is well, basically. Maybe a slight medication adjustment, but otherwise it just makes sense to have a bit of trouble when you see your son lying in an ICU looking like he lost a face smashing battle with a large blunt object.

So, overall, it was a good day filled with good news. But I got to read the bedtime story with Jasper tonight for the first time in two weeks. That in itself made it a great day.

And finally, bonus points to anyone who can decipher the title of this post without using Google or any other web search engine.