The Servant's Quarters

10:43 PM - Just one more thing to add. I want to say thanks for the comment and e-mails that I received throughout the evening. You were all very encouraging and very funny. God bless you!!!!

10:23 PM - We just spoke with Dr. Israel. The surgery went fine. He said that it was a wide incission to make certain that he got everything, but Mom's mastectomy has been completed successfully.

She'll spend an hour or two in recovery before being taken up to her room. The doctor told us that she will be in the hospital at least through the weekend, depending on how she feels. Biopsies were taken of the surrounding tissues, and those results will not be ready for 2 or 3 days.

Given the lateness of the hour and the fact that nothing else is going to happen tonight until Mom's out of recovery, I'm going to close up shop for tonight. Thanks to everyone who read the blog tonight and joined us in prayer. God bless you. Please keep lifting Mom up in prayer and keep seeking the Lord for the results of the remaining biopsies.

No cancer!!!!

Good night.

10:00 PM - All right. Back online after dinner. Well, what passed for dinner, anyway. Wow. The cafeteria was serving nothing but leftovers. My main course was a chicken pita that must have been sitting on it's bed of ice since 10:00 AM. Not bad but not bursting with freshness. My side dishes were a bowl of chicken noodle soup and a plate of deep fried cod. That pretty much amounts to all that was being served.

On the bright side, I'm not hungry. Thanks, God, for filling my belly again.

As an afterthought, all three of the Butler boys scored cookies. I had noticed these large, homemade chocolate chip cookies by the cash register. Again, to show my iron resolve and incredible self-discipline, I refrain from getting one. Right after I put down the last bite of chicken pita, I excused myself to "just go walk around." I scooted right to the cash register and bought my cookie. Back at the table, we waited for Dad to come back from the bathroom and watched an episode of ER. I became engrossed in the show, and a few minutes later, I turned around and discovered that Mark had a cookie like mine.

"Hey," I says, "I didn't know you wanted a cookie."

"I didn't until I saw yours."

"Hey," says Dad as he pulls up, "Where'd you guys get the cookies?"

After getting the details, he headed off to buy one of his own.

No new news on Mom. Hopefully we'll hear anytime.

8:44 PM - Suddenly, everything happened really fast.

Right after my last entry, Mom was given an injection to relax her. (Which it did. She was looking mighty relaxed. Practically unconscious.) Then, she taken right out and into surgery.

According to the nurse, the operation should last about an hour to an hour and a half. So, I'm going to sign off and get some dinner. I'll be back on after I eat. Please keep us in prayer. If all goes well, Mom will be out of surgery at around 10:00 PM.

8:31 PM - All right. We're cooking a little bit now. Dr. Israel's been in to see us, and now a nurse is going through some pre-op questions with Mom. Hopefully, she'll go in very soon.

7:38 PM - Sheesh. We're still sitting here waiting. Apparently, Dr. Israel is still working on his current victim...... I mean, patient. We've decided to not bug out and grab dinner. We're going to stay by Mom until she goes into surgery. We'll have a late supper after that.

7:00 PM - Sorry for the delay in updating everyone.

We've been at Mom's bedside since the last update, over an hour ago. Nothing's happening so far. She's just sitting here with an IV waiting and feeling anxious. Obviously, the surgery isn't going to start at 7:00 PM, but it hopefully won't be much longer. I think she's the only patient waiting at this point. We're all alone here in the "Ready Room."

More soon.....

5:40 PM - Dad's just been taken back to visit Mom before the operation. Only one visitor at time right now, so I'll have to wait my turn.

The TV news is running practically continuous coverage of the fact the Tom Hanks and Ron Howard were in town today to watch the Tigers play at Comerica Park. Ron, the hat thing isn't working. We all know you're bald. From one bald red head to another - Forget it, baby. Don't try to hide it. Be proud.

4:57 PM - Mom's just been taken back to the "Ready Room" to be prepped for surgery. At last, some progress!!!

And Oprah is just wrapping. Things are definitely looking better around here.

4:36 PM - Okay. Finally a nurse has come out to talk to us. A few minutes ago, Mom also got a chance to talk to one of the ladies who ran her class at the hospital yesterday. Here's the latest scoop -

Surgery is being delayed until 7:00 PM. We've found out that she's being sent back to 9 North, the floor where she got such crummy care last week. (This is where they put all the women who have mastectomies, apparently. So, there's no choice in the matter. She has to go there.) Since 9 North has no private rooms, Mom's going to have a roommate. (She had been promised a private room to make up for some of the horrid treatment she received before.) Further, the nurse told her that she had only imagined that it took her over 4 hours to get the Benedryl that she needed to make her allergic itching go away. He said that it probably only took a few minutes, but it felt like hours because she was so uncomfortable. (Apparently, my watch was pretty uncomfortable as well. It also thought that it took over four hours to get the medication.)

Last night, Mom gave me a handwritten letter to the hospital administrator complaining about how she had been treated after her last surgery. I'm supposed to type it up and mail it. She just asked me to wait on it until she's home after this surgery. She may have to add some additional chapters.

Oh man! Someone just turned on Oprah. Looks like it only has about 15 minutes left. Thank goodness.

4:23 PM - Waiting, waiting, waiting......

So far a whole lot of nothing is happening. We're trying to stay patient. The good news that we received earlier is making it quite a bit easier to handle the waiting.

The receptionist just got up and announced to everyone in a loud voice, "I'm going to the bathroom now! If you need assistance, Jessica will be here to help you!" She walked up and down the waiting room telling everyone that she was on her way to answer the call of nature. It may have been the waiting, but we found this hilarious. Mom and I really had to suppress our giggles. But I feel kind of sorry for her. Imagine having a job where you had to inform a large room full of strangers that you had to go and use the john. Yikes!

Victory and then defeat! Mark told me where I could find the plate of cookies! They are here! I waited what I thought was a respectful amount of time to demonstrate that I could control myself. Then I announced that I was going to get a cup of coffee. Going into the snack area, I found a silver plate containing nothing but cookie crumbs. NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Without thought of anyone else's needs, my fellow waiting room denizens had hogged all the cookies to themselves! Pigs! Mom suggested that I buy some cookies for myself out of the vending machine. Somehow that just wouldn't be the same....

3:45 PM - Greetings All!

Sorry it's taken me a bit longer than I thought to get on with the blogging. Mr. Ford asked me to stop up at World Headquarters to try to figure out how to save the company. I stopped in for a little while, but as usual, he has no idea what he's talking about and has no good ideas. He just wants to star in more commercials. So I told him to get lost.

Actually, that's not true. I was late getting here because of kid issues. Why can't they just ever cooperate and do what they're told? Sigh.

Anyway, we're all up here. (Mom, Dad, Mark, and me) We're not in the same waiting area as we were last time. That was the Outpatient Surgery Waiting Room. I guess this place is for patients who are going to be staying in the hospital. This is a much nicer place. More open. Bigger. More comfortable.

No cookies though. I'd trade all this luxuary for the plate of cookies I had in the other waiting room.

There's nothing to report yet. Mom's checked in. That's all. We overheard someone on staff telling another family that for some reason, everything's taking longer today than usual. Great. It's not like you could call this place "speedy" that last time I was here. So who knows when things will start cookin'.