Portal Vein Embolization down, one liver resection to go! The PVE went well and the doc said "it was a very difficult procedure", which is evident by the 15 poke holes I have in my ribcage. He said it was hard to get to the portal vein from the angle he was aiming from b/c the tumors were in the way. My surgeon does not "allow" the Interventional Radiologists to go in from the opposite side, so he had to get it done from the more difficult angle. Today when I was trying to clean off all the Betadine junk off my stomach/chest area, I kept trying to wipe off these red dots on my side too, turns out they were all holes where they had inserted the guide needle unsuccessfully. They use an ultra sound machine to guide the needle and when they find the right spot, then they go in with the heavy machinery.

The first day/night in the hospital the pain wasn't too bad, when someone is offering you Morphine through an IV, it's kind of hard to say no. I stayed drugged on Morphine for about 12 hours, which is a fast acting drug, so it did not provide me with much more than an hour or 2 of relief at a time. I tried taking oral pain meds that would last longer but I couldn't hold anything down and I just ended up throwing them up. The pain just kind of faded away by this morning and I was up and about with no problems and I managed to hold down some good old Southern grits for breakfast. I crashed when I got home, I think I slept for almost 4 hours, it was soooo nice to be back in my bed. The best thing about the PVE is that it relieved my cancer pains which were crippling me for the last week. I am so happy to be pain free right now, I hope I don't jinx it! Thanks again for everyone's support and words of encouragement. I hope to be back on the island for an extended stay in about 4 weeks, I will let you know when my surgery date is finalized.