Surgery Day: Morning Update

Thanks to everyone who is stopping by to stay up to date with Kate's surgery today. We arrived early at 6:30am for pre-op with surgery scheduled for 8:30am. I wondered what we were going to do with all that time, but it took every bit of it to talk to the ten-plus doctors, residents, and nurses about the procedure. Everyone was kind, patient, very thorough and above all, very human.

They wheeled Kate back right on time at 8:30am, and they told us that the surgery should take about three hours plus another two hours for reconstruction. From all the conversations with her medical team, here are some specific things you can be praying for today:

Her nerve block: The anaesthesiologist explained that they are going to use an ultrasound to inject a blocking agent into the nerves on Kate's chest. This will greatly reduce pain for up to 24 hours. Kate had some anxiety about this coming in having read about cases where nerve blocks didn't work and patients woke up in significant pain..
Skin health for reconstruction: This is a big one. The surgeons will remove all the breast tissue, right up to the skin as part of the mastectomy procedure. Then the plastic surgery team will evaluate the health of the skin and determine if they can put in implants immediately or if they'll need to insert "skin expanders." These devices are used if there's not enough healthy skin. As the name implies, they remain in the breast area, slowly inflating over time to stretch and expand the remaining skin.. If this is required it'll take about six months, and Kate will have to come back for a second surgery then. We're really praying this all gets done today.
Lymph node biopsy: During surgery, Kate's doctor will remove 2-5 lymph nodes in order to biopsy them. This will determine whether there are indications of further spread or not and dictates the next course of treatment. We won't get results for 5-10 days, but obviously we're praying for no indications of additional spread of the cancer.

That's all for now — thank you for being here. I'll provide another update later as we know more. Thanks so much for caring and praying for Kate and our family.

Live updates:

9:37am - Just got a text that the procedure just began
10:37am, 11:37am - Got texts "The procedure is progressing." Not particularly helpful!