Tomorrow (Tuesday, July 16th) is surgery day. Our good friend Devin Mudge will remove the lung nodule from Blake's lower, left lobe. He will probably have to remove about half the lobe. The nodule has grown from 9mm to 16mm, so it is definitely growing and it will great to get it out and know what it is. We hope to have a pathology report by the end of the week.
Blake will be at St. Mary's in Apple Vally. For locals, the drive is about an hour. You go up the 15 and then take Highway 18 S for 3 miles. We will be staying (all 4 of us) up in Apple Valley for the week. Blake will be in ICU with an epidural for the first few days. Then transitioned to IV pain meds. We were very pleased to learn that all the rooms are private! When can tolerate the pain on just oral meds, we can go home. It will take about a week. Please call before driving up for a visit. There are just many things we don't know about how the recovery will progress.
Blake saw his cardiologist again today. He does have some cardiac damage from one of the chemos (a common side effect) but Dr. Marais (who is amazing) said it is nothing to worry about. After the surgery he will put Blake on some cardiac meds. But he did observe improvement in the echo's from May to now, so that is great. Dr. Marais also reassured us in a similar manner to what Devin has said--this loss of lung will have no noticeable affect on Blake in any way. We are basically built with a surplus of lung capacity.
Dr. Marais reminded us how awesome it is that Blake's surgeon tomorrow will be praying over him. We are so thankful for Devin in that regard especially. All of your prayers with us are appreciated so much.
Finally, Blake made a new movie. Origami and stop-motion have now officially collided. I'm sure he would appreciate watching his view count grow tonight!
