Live long and prosper

Well. Um. Yeah.

Sitting in the sublevel of Methodist Hospital in San Antonio. Across the street is the Health Science Center where I honed my skills as a molecular biologist oh so many years ago. Somewhere on this floor, a doctor has his hands inside my mother's abdomen.

My mother has ovarian cancer, and it was discovered that the tumor is too large to treat with only chemotherapy first before surgery. Instead, the gynocologic oncologist wanted to do surgery and then chemo. We agreed. About two hours ago, the doc called me aside and asked me to make a decision about my mother's innards:

The tumor is large. BIG. GIANT. It grew into the uterus, but even worse, it grew into the signoid colon. This means that in order to remove this tumor, roughly the size of a cantaloupe, the doc must remove my mom's colon. He asked for my permission. As the assigned person with medical power of attorney (which we set up only yesterday), I said yes.

He hurried back to Mom who was still on the operating table with some of her female parts already removed, and more to be excised upon my decision.

And now, my mom is either having her colon rebuilt, or she will wear a colostomy bag for the rest of her life. And that's not what any of us expected.

It's a bit bizarre to be the one who said, "Yeah" to the removal of my mother's colon. It had to be done.

So, I sit here in the sublevel of the hospital, surrounded by Phil, Amos, and my two sisters. We have our brave faces on, and we await the signal that Mom is out of surgery and on her way to a recovery room.

And I am preparing myself for eventually telling her that her colon no longer exists.

Her doctor is a Star Trek freak. I greeted him with the split hand gesture of the Vulcan race. He now thinks I'm great.

So, live long and prosper, Mom. We'll get through this.