11 August 2003

Early Sunday morning (10 August 2003), a brain scan revealed Liddy's cancer has metastasized to her brain. Tomorrow (12 August 2003) she will have an operation (a craniotomy) in which the neurosurgeon will attempt to remove the two largest tumors. This is a serious operation which is scheduled to begin at 2 PM and will last anywhere from 4 to 8 hours, depending in whether or not he can remove both tumors in one surgical sitting. We will update you on the outcome of the surgery sometime Wednesday morning. Here is some background on these events. Bev and I were with Liddy all day last Monday.  We sorted through a few hundred photos to select those for posting on the tour log for the Danish Bike Tour. She seemed fine. On Tuesday, she began to experience some bouts of nausea and headache (which increased during coughing and movement). Both the nausea and the headaches increased during the week. We were with her and Tom on Friday before her chemo treatment to meet with her oncologist to discuss a number of treatment options that we had researched to deal with the lung metastases. She reported some disorientation and pain in the upper back in addition to the nausea and headache at this meeting. Her oncologist scheduled a brain scan for Monday morning. On Saturday, however, things got a bit worse and her oncologist suggested in a phone consultation that she go to the ER at the hospital.  Bruce met her and Tom there about 8 PM. Bev was babysitting two of our grandchildren, Isabel and Miles. The attending ER physician had a brain scan (MRI) done around 11 PM. Around 1:30 AM (Sunday), we were told she had two metastasized nodules, one in each hemisphere. She was immediately admitted into the NICU (neurological intensive care unit) in the hospital.  Yesterday (Sunday) we were with her and Tom at the hospital and learned the situation is quite serious. There are actually three tumors (not two "nodules"): one in the left frontal lobe, one in the right frontal lobe and one near the occipital lobe. Both of the frontal tumors are large. We had a number of conversations with physicians throughout the day yesterday and today. They have no idea how the tumor has gotten so large without the pronounced brain tumor symptoms being present months ago. They are quite concerned about increased intracranial pressure and are giving her drugs to reduce it. She is on pain medication and .drifts in and out. of sleep much of the day. She had another MRI that included the gathering of stereotactic data to produce precise 3D position information about the tumor locations (for a potential surgery). This morning (11 August 2003), Liddy, Tom and we met with her oncologist at 8 AM. After hearing what she said about the neurosurgeon's analysis, Liddy decided to undergo the operation. She is, as you've now come to know, a real fighter. Throughout the day she had some additional tests (an X-Ray and a test to evaluate pulmonary function and fluid in the lungs). We waited six and a half very, very long hours before the neurosurgeon met with us and explained the operation, and showed us the MRI images of the tumors. The neurosurgeon believes the operation will relieve the terrible headaches and nausea she is experiencing, and hopes the operation will have minimal impact on other functionality, such as cognitive processes, motor function and speech. Furthermore, if the operation goes well, she could potentially be home in 7-8 days. The hours were long because we saw her condition deteriorate through the day as she went from sluggish responses to non-responsive and faded in and out of a light sleep state.. Miraculously, she did a turnaround when the neurosurgeon came into the room and by the time Bruce, Sarah, Matthew and Karen came to visit, she was knew them by name and even made a few jokes. This is a very serious operation. She and the family need all of the prayers they can get. Furthermore we do not know yet how and when the treatments for the lung metastases will proceed and how the third brain tumor will be dealt with.

Copyright © 2003 The Shriver Family: Last modified: 01/06/04.