An update on my Health

Some major things are happening and I thought I would let everyone know. Last Monday I had my routine surgery. They were going to try to remove my stents and hope that everything would drain properly and I could stop having surgery every three months. Unfortunately when they attempted this it was discovered that the scar tissue was too much and there was no draining. So, the stents were changed and I was sent home to rest.

Wednesday I went into my urologists office to discuss our next step, removing the left kidney. Just to clear things up my kidney is perfectly healthy. Its the ureters that are damaged. My tumor crushed my left ureters (I have two ureters on both sides). My kidney filled up with fluid and ripped open before anyone knew that I had cancer. When I was finally properly diagnosed I had bags put in and my kidney was given a chance to heal, which it did. However the ureters that were crushed remained crushed and also started getting scar tissue which made them even more damaged. I had the stents which allowed fluid to flow from my kidney to my bladder but those stents must be changed ever three months.

They are removing my kidney because there is no other way to bypass the ureters. We now know that we cannot simply take the stents out and let things work themselves out. We are also unable to cut off the bad part and re attach to the bladder because I had radiation. The radiation leaves all my organs thin and attempting to reattach would most likely rip my bladder.

Because of the radiation they are also not able to remove my kidney laproscopacly. They are not able to have any contact with my abdomen whatsoever. This means they will be cutting my 11th rib and removing the kidney from my side. I will be in the hospital for three days. For those of you in the Boston area I would LOVE some visitors. I will be at the Baptist from April 20-22/23 (2-3 days in the hospital not sure exactly which yet).

Look @ the fish Bryan caught!

Hope everyone is doing well and wish me luck!