July 20, 2005

hey everyone...
First of all, thank you for all of the prayers, cards, emails, plants, flowers, and food we've received. We feel truly blessed and are grateful for each of them, and especially you!

Secondly, sorry we haven't been back to you all till now. I got home Sunday and haven't been doing much of anything since. This is the first time I've gotten online.
Update time, forgive me if some of this is old news to some of you. Read, skim or ignore.

The surgery was long but "uneventful" according to the doctors- which is good. The general surgeon said he had never spent so much time on a mastectomy before because he kept thinking of his wife when he looked at me. He also took several lymph nodes. The huge praise on this is that the pathology returned at lightening speed and we found out Friday that the tumor had clear margins, meaning they got all the cancer, and the the lymph nodes were negative for cancer. YEAH!!!!! Thank you God!!!

Friday was not a great day though. I'd been taking lots of morphine on little food and for some reason my potassium levels dropped dangerously low. I vomited several times, (yeah pretty painful!!), and was pretty unresponsive all day. That was a litle scary, but Saturday I was better after it was all figured out.

The plastic surgeon did an amazing job. Part of the reconstruction used tissue from my abdomen and all of that is healing well. Unfortunately, the binder, or girdle, that was wrapped around my torso has given me an awful itchy, red, blistery rash over all the areas it was touching, basically top of legs to armpits. I am now on steriods for that and the binder is history.

We were also thankful for our nurses too. They were all great, thanks Rachel!!! But we were happy to go home on Sunday.

Other than those two fun things, I'm doing pretty well. The pain was very intense at first, but now it's not that bad. The rash is actually more bothersome than the incisions. I'm up and walking some, but spending most of my time in bed still.

The kids are doing well. They understand mommy is sore but they all come in and spend time talking, watching t.v. or reading together. My mom has been an angel personified, we'd be lost without her. Tim is doing well too. For those who were praying for stress in his business, thank you... it is doing well and some of the stress has lessened.

We have a long road ahead, but we now see the light at the end of the tunnel. God has been so good preparing us for this adventure and opportunity, He's been just as good during it, and I am confident He will be with us as I recover and get back to normal. I'm praying for you all, love you all, and can't wait to talk with each of you.
See you soon,

resting in Him, Linnea