The Results

Today was another step in the right direction. Sharon was able to spend another day in the company of a good friend. Debbie spent the day with her and called to give lots of updates on her way home. The physical therapist worked with Sharon today, he had her up and walking through the hallways. He also was able to show her an easier way to get up from bed and and get back into bed since she is still finding that challenging. He also thought she was too healthy and improving too much to go to a recovery center as was first thought yesterday. Instead he suggested that Sharon go home and have an occupational therapist and physical therapist come in to work with her during the week. So, with just the approval of Dr. Adams it looks like Sharon will be able to come home! She did ask to stay at UVA until Thursday to give herself one more day in their care to get a little stronger.

Debbie said that she was able to read all of my blog entries as well as all of your comments to Sharon. She thoroughly enjoyed hearing all of your kind thoughts. She also said that Sharon was eating solid foods for dinner; lasagna, salad and chocolate cake. Although she enjoyed the Ensure shake she was able to have more than her dinner.

After Debbie's phone call, Brad and I talked to Sharon. Dr. Adams had just been into see her with the results from all of the tests. All of the samples from the pancreas he took were negative! There was also no other signs of tumors on any other blood vessels. This is all great. The only news that we didn't want to hear is that in just 1 of the 23 lymph nodes that he removed they did find cancerous cells. He said usually they can find between 8-14 lymph nodes infected but Sharon only had 1! What this means is that she'll definitely have to undergo another round of chemo with Dr. Major in a few weeks, just to make sure that they can get any stay cells that the lymph node may have released. She will have a follow up appointment with Dr. Adams in about 4 weeks and she'll be in contact with Dr. Major when she gets home later this week to set up an appointment with him.

Overall I think Sharon received an excellent report, she seemed to be in good spirits again today. Her pain level was still manageable on her pain pills (except for early this morning when her night nurse didn't wake her up to take them). She has one more full day in the hospital to continue to build her stength back up, then she gets to come home and start the next phase of the journey surrounded by Ll her friends and family.