Port is out

So here's the short of it,
The offending port is out!  I'm actually awake, but looking very forward to a nice rest tonight.

And here's the long

Well, I'm home and I'm actually in pretty good shape this evening. I went to get my radiation treatment early today so I'd be on time for my surgery.  Ashley and Shelaine, my radiation technicians, got a kick out of writing "Please do not erase" in permanent marker along my radiation line nearest the surgical site. And believe it or not, it did not get erased.   I'm guessing that the procedure didn't take 10 or 15 minutes!  I went back into the surgery intake room a little after 2.  While I was there, a doctor friend came by with a nurse.  It turns out she was borrowing a room to take out her own stitches from a procedure she had done!  We had a quick nice hug.  Anyway soon it was time for me get into my hospital gown, surrender my glasses, and go to the big holding room --- into a recliner and get the IV started.  All the people who would be on my team, one by one came by and asked all the appropriate questions and such.  They had taken my glasses away so I was terribly handicapped! 

I sat there for about an hour and a half!  But it was OK.  I was feeling ever so grateful that Dr. Witherspoon had been able to work me in this afternoon instead of waiting til Monday.  I would have waited for 3 hours if necessary.  She got there a little before 4 and her comment was pretty interesting.  She said, something like, you are the poster child for if it can go wrong, it will; but she assured me that the procedure would be quick and pretty simple. She also assured me that I'm not a unique medical case (something none of us really want to be.)  She said that port removal is often done in the office, but in my particular case, it might be a little more leaky and messy than they would want to handle in an inpatient setting. In no time I was coming awake and I think we were home by about 5:30.  I think they must have given me very little sedative because I'm really very alert tonight.  Of course, I may just collapse into the bed here in a little while. 

The incision is pretty sore, no doubt, but I already feel a bit of difference in the achy feeling on my port side.  I'm feeling very optimistic that I'll just feel better and better every day.  I'm to continue the Lovenox tomorrow afternoon, and then start the Coumidan tomorrow evening.  My pharmacist called me to let me know that the synthroid that I take on a daily basis interacts with the Coumidan to make it more potent and told me to watch carefully for bruising.  Once I told him they would be doing blood counts on a daily basis he was much more relaxed.  I was glad he called. 

So all in all, today is another step forward.  Yesterday put me half-way through my Herceptin treatments, and today was treatment 15 of 36 radiation treatments.  It's feeling like I'm getting close to a NASA TV countdown - (you know they start counting down days before they actually put it on TV - it won't be too long before I'll actually be on the 10, 9, 8 count!