The Long Awaited Surgery

Looking back to when we first learned of Derek's pancreatic cancer diagnosis and heard about the grim statistics for a positive outcome, my brother, Jeffrey, reminded us that we had every reason to be hopeful. We chose to ignore the statistics and focus on the fact that Derek was an outlier. His age, overall health, stage of diagnosis and treatment regimen put him in a new category of patients. We told Derek over and over again: "It's not a 0% chance. Someone has to beat this thing. It might as well be you."

Yesterday went better than anyone could have possibly imagined. Despite a treacherous storm that passed through the city as our family and dearest friends traveled down to U of C to join me in the hospital waiting room, the sky brightened and the sun began to shine just as we got the call that the surgeon had moved beyond the initial scope to proceed with the full surgery. One of Derek's biggest fears was that he would awaken to the news that the surgery could not be completed, and so we cheered for this small victory.

Just a few hours after that call, when the doctor paged me from the operating room and said he was coming up to speak with me, my heart dropped. It had only been about four hours, and we were expecting the surgery to last much longer. Preparing myself for news of a partial resection, we found a quiet corner of the waiting room for us to talk. I steadied myself and leaned in closely to hear the doctor explain what had happened.

The doctor began by sharing that Derek's surgery had gone "better than expected." Though a small part of the colon had to be removed and there was considerable blood loss, the tumor was "nowhere near the celiac axis." What had made Derek's case so complicated all along was not even an issue during surgery. After he described the details of the full procedure, he finished with the four words that all families in this situation pray to hear spoken aloud: we got it all.

Although the pathology report will take a full week to receive, we remain hopeful that yesterday's surgery yielded an R0 resection with clean margins. The preliminary results look very good, so they say we should consider the surgery "a win."

My oldest, dearest friend, Becca wrote a beautiful blog post last night about what it was like to be with us to witness the news that the surgery was a success. She captured the emotion far better than I ever could because I was in such a state of disbelief.

We are not out of the woods yet and may never be able to use the term cured, but we feel extremely fortunate to know that Derek's overall prognosis improves now that surgery is behind us. We are humbled by the outpouring of love and support for our family and grateful to have so many of you following along as our journey unfolds. Thank you for lifting us up and helping us believe that Derek will win this battle. After all, someone has to beat this thing. It might as well be him.