This summer has held no shortage of adventures in the Greer family! It all started out at the end of the school year/beginning of the summer back in June when I had a CT Scan done to investigate the cause of the strange abdominal and back pain I was having. Fully expecting to hear that they could see nothing abnormal and had no good answer, I was instead told that I had a large mass on the right lobe of my liver. :-O Testing and appointments related to this and the continual discomfort remained in the background of our other summer activities, changing our plans for a long road trip vacation entirely and leaving us pretty much at the mercy of the schedule of the military medical facilities. We did manage to fit in quite a bit of fun this summer in spite of all of that.
Sage was up visiting Del and I from Georgia from June 13-July 2nd, during which time we managed to teach her how to ride her bike without training wheels. This was quite the exercise for both Del and myself. I have to say that I now fully appreciate what my parents went through when running behind my bike when I was little. Whoever invented the little bar that attaches to the back of the kid's bike nowadays is a genius! At least our backs were saved as a result. It was great to see the pride on her face when she realized I had long since let go and she had ridden it herself for the first time!
While Sage was away on her beach trip in North Carolina with her mom, Del and I not only celebrated our one year wedding anniversary on July 7th, but the movers also came the next day to take our stuff over to our new 3 bedroom townhouse on base housing at Ft Meade (still in Maryland, near Columbia). We LOVE our new place which we took the time to paint in spite of all the other chaos. Having colors after years of only the white walls of rule-restricted apartments is wonderful and well worth the effort!
Sage was thrilled to meet all of the kids in our new neighborhood once she returned to Maryland from her beach trip on July 13th. She met twin girls that she immediately took a liking to and they were practically inseparable for the rest of her visit! She regularly came in requesting "ice pops for the girls" and other such "necessities." ;-D My mom and Dan also came for a visit to check out the new place and see Sage. She made sure to take them for a swim at our community pool to make their trip complete. We also had great fun when the twins came for a slumber party at our house during Sage's last week here; making our own ice cream and S'mores, playing games, and painting nails. Then Sage flew back down to Georgia on July 26th after we spent the day at a German festival as a family.
We then switched gears back to my health concerns for Del and I to meet again with the liver surgeon on the morning of Monday, July 28th at Walter Reed. Surgery is now scheduled for Thursday, August 7th. Yes, THAT fast! After having to practically push everything else through the system with both hands all summer long, he tells us that he can schedule surgery for next week already! During the surgery, the plan is to remove the mass along with some of the surrounding healthy liver tissue to ensure full removal and then get an analysis of the mass from pathology. The major indications are still pointing to benign causes, namely something called FNH, but they won't be certain until it is out and analyzed. I will be in ICU at Walter Reed for a day or 2 after the surgery and will be an inpatient at the hospital for at least 5 days in total. I can have visitors both while in ICU and in the room they move me to afterwards, so if you're in the neighborhood and want to drop in then feel free. They won't let you bring flowers in because of my asthma and the struggle the muscles over my lungs will already be having to do without an added asthma attack. Of course you shouldn't bring anything other than yourselves for a visit anyway, but I figured I better mention it in case anyone had any crazy ideas. ;-D I should add that they WILL check ID, vehicle registration, and possibly do a quick vehicle search if you're non-military and that parking is absolutely atrocious at Walter Reed. What's that?! I haven't scared you off yet?! We'll keep you posted on visiting hours just in case then.
Beyond surgery, the doctor also told me to expect to not return to work for 6-8 weeks, which means I unfortunately won't make it back for the start of the school year and no coaching middle school girls' soccer this fall either! :-( All of that will make behaving myself and resting at home harder to do, but it is necessary for that miraculous organ the liver to do its magic and regrow itself. Yes, regrow itself!!! Did you know that they can remove up to 80% of your liver and it will grow back!!! The human body is really a miraculous thing! While Del and I do feel that this is the right decision, considering the pain I've been in for quite a while and the need to find out definitely what it is, the whole thing is still a pretty scary prospect! It certainly didn't help when they handed me an "Advance Directive" packet to fill out, which I know is just protocol and all. But come on! Who wants to be asked about whether they want an autopsy and other such lovely stuff prior to going in to be operated on?!
With all of that said, we will keep all of you posted via this blog throughout the whole process. The postings will come from either myself or Del and you can leave messages for us and others if you feel so inclined. Keep it decent, I must request, as this is a PUBLIC forum and I am sharing this with family, friends, and colleagues (Not that I'd have anything to worry about I'm sure! ;-D). In the meantime, please keep Del and I in your prayers or if you're not one to pray then please send positive healthy vibes my way instead. Thanks so much for all of your concern and offers to help out so far! It really means a lot to us. Future posts should be much shorter than this one, but I just plain had a lot to say and we all know that I love to tell long stories when I get the chance. ;-D Please know that having such wonderful family, friends, and colleagues definitely makes times like this much easier! Thanks again!