The Latest News From Houston, Y’all

Here is an update on Kelly per Kelly‘s request written by Marla. Now that you have the disclaimer, shall we proceed?

The last four days have been wall to wall appointments, testing, doctors and needles. There were blood draws, ultrasounds, CT scans, echocardiograms plus meetings with Doctors galore. Tomorrow it’s MRI’s and Anesthesia Assessments plus a planning meeting or two. Her potassium is low so they are pounding her with pills hoping the surgery won’t be postponed. There is also a question regarding her heart, so we are waiting for test results.

If all goes as planned and test results are as hoped for, surgery will take place Monday morning. Dr. Weinberg will remove the entire brain tumor . Dr Hanasono will then take over once the tumor is gone and complete the surgery. The entire surgery should be 10-12 hours. Kel will be in ICU for 1-3 days and in the hospital for several weeks at least. Within the first week they want to begin therapy to get her up and moving and learning how to work with what she has. The best news is they will be weaning her off the steroids which will bring her weight down and stop destroying her bones, skin and internal organs.

Kel, Char & I have had an interesting week to say the least. We have had our usual sisterly bickering and bantering. More importantly, we have been brutal with one another as we always are in stressful situations leading to absolute hysterical laughter. Some people are touchy feely. Others keep their emotions buried deep inside. We beat the snot out of one another verbally and feel better. Look up dysfunctional. This will all make sense.

One example, just in case you still don’t get it. We were all in the plastic surgeons office. Dr. Hanasono will be doing the closing of her wound. He will need to take a muscle from her back, a vein from her leg and skin from the other leg for grafting. He then began explaining how they will “teach” me (Marla) how to keep all this clean. I am pretty sure at this point all three of us girls were feeling rather light-headed ……. Especially Kelly (no pun intended)

This is when we got the great idea to suggest they might use skin from her buttocks as she could be quite a butthead at times. This sent the three of us into hysterics. I am pretty sure that is why a behavioral psychologist has been added to the schedule of appointments. We all need help ……. Obviously!

Most of the rudeness can’t be shared because, well, you needed to be there to get it and maybe even then you wouldn’t. We are just a weird set of sisters. I can say, I have never seen a Dr. laugh the way we had Weinberg laughing one day. The dude was howling!

The truth is Kelly is scared and Char & I are heartsick for her. Proverbs says, Laughter can conceal a heavy heart, but when the laughter ends, the grief remains. That pretty well sums it up.