Decision made

I called my surgeon's office yesterday with the decision to go forward with more surgery (vs. radiation). I'm tentatively scheduled for May 11, with pre-op meetings for the day before. Surgery might get bumped up to May 4; I hope so - the earlier the better!

I realize I'm taking a risk by not going with radiation. Surgery will hopefully address the "margins" issue (the possibility of cancer being left behind from the original tumor in the posterior section of the incision), but it doesn't address the "tumor thickness" issue. Apparently, my tumor was of a thickness that bumps me into a higher risk group - I have 30-50% greater chance of recurrance. And though unlikely, there is the chance that even with surgery, they might discover that the tumor did weird things and tentacled out, and that it can't all be removed surgically. So, there is the chance that I might go through all this and still need radiation after all. But, they gave me the choice - it wasn't a hard & fast enough case to recommend radiation over surgery.

I am in God's hands. My hope & prayer is that no cancer will be found at all. If it is found, then I pray that Dr. Lueg can successfully remove it all, with no need for radiation follow-up. And then I pray that there will be no recurrance down the road. If there's no recurrance within the first 2 years, then I'd be 98% clear.

This whole complicated situation has definitely got me crying out to God a little more intensely than usual. I want to reach a place of confident trust in Him, knowing that whatever He allows is for my good, and not fearing possible outcomes. I know that in my head, but I'm not... quite... there... yet in my heart.

Thank-you for your continued prayers.