I just spoke with Joe (I'm back in BG). They changed his pain meds from fentanyl to dilaudid. He is a little nauseous- could be from the med change. He has not had food yet.

He sat in the chair for 30 minutes and took a walk from his bed to the door of his room. Running a 5K again is not far off.

We did get to talk with Dr. K yesterday. We asked how long the tumor was there and he said most likely years. Since Joe never had a reason for a CT scan it was never found. It could have continued until there were symptoms. It was expected that there has been blood in the urine for sometime but was over looked or just not tested for the times he had urine tests for insurance or work.
Pathology reports will dictate the next steps but there is still a chance it is benign. If not this type of cancer does not respond to Chemo or radiation but there are targeted drug therapies. A PET Scan would also not show if it is elsewhere in the body. Dr. K said if anything part of it could have come off in the vena cava and traveled to the lung like an embolism but chest x-rays does not show that as a concern.
He is not on food yet but thinks they are going to start him on tea and broth today. They also want to control the pain more because while he sleeps through the pain, when he wakes (and not pushing the pain pump button when he sleeps) it is hard to get the pain back under control when he wakes.
Other than the pain, Joe's other complaint is he can't watch Cleveland Indians games because the cable does not have Fox Sports Ohio. He thinks it is outrages that even though the Cleveland Clinic sponsors the Indians broadcast the hospital cables does not show it. I set up his iPhone with a stream of WTAM 1100 in hopes they will stream the game audio. If not he can enjoy all the ESPN Sports Center he wants.

Thanks for keeping us in your thoughts.

They got Joe up again yesterday afternoon. He sat in the chair for 30-40 minutes and was very sore. He was happy to get back to bed and get an extra dose of pain medication. The moving from bed to chair went better but sitting up took a lot of concentration to deal with the pain. I got back to BG about 10pm Tuesday night.

Again thanks for all the prayers.

Katie

They got Joe up and out of bed already this morning. Just to stand and sit up right in another chair. It hurt a lot and wore him out. He had a purple popsicle but no food yet other than the eucharistic minister stopping by and him taking part. He is sleeping again.

Thank you all for your continued prayers and kind thoughts.

I just saw Joe. He was aware of things around him but still groggy. Mentioned he wanted a Vernors- which is what he told me when I saw him last before surgery. He said he hurts a lot. Once he gets to his room we can see him.

Joe is out of surgery. It took just about 3 hours. All went well. The tumor was into the vena cava but was removed easily and vena cava was stitched up- no need for removal of part of the vena cava. It will take a few days to a week for pathology reports.

Thank you all for your prayers!

Joe enjoyed his magnesium citrate cocktails. We have been watching movies TNT we never would have given a second thought to. We are going to bed soon since we have to be at the hospital at 5am.

We are grateful for the prayers and the good thoughts from everyone.