Dumo Cell Carcinoma

Dan has been in the hospital 16 days. He has received 19 units of blood during and after surgery, up to today. From the date of surgery to about 7 days after, Dan gained 40 pounds of extra body fluid. There are five new stretch marks on each knee due to the rapid swelling endured. Right now, Dan is in the middle of dialysis treatment number 10. Each dialysis treatment is 4 hours long. Everytime Dan does dialysis, they remove about 3 litres of fluid from his body. (Then throw back in a pint of saline.) Dan has the blood type O+, which means he can receive O+ and O- blood. Every time someone donates blood  they donate 450ml, just over 1 pint or unit of blood. (Thank you, donors!) Dan is wearing sandals 3 sizes too big (due to the extra fluid swelling up his feet) just so he can walk around the hospital without wearing their silly slip-free socks with the happy face. Dan does several laps around the recovery ward every day. Doctors had to break 2 ribs to get to...

The last week has been slow going for Dan, with some improvement and some minor setbacks. First and foremost, yes, he is still in the hospital, still in 314 on floor 3South. We ask everyday about a private room, but no luck yet. He's had half the staples removed from his incision, and he's healing well. Pain is very manageable. On the 24th he did indeed have both chest tubes and catheter removed, and he became tube free! He only had the IV in his arm for the blood thinner heparin. For a few days, that's all it was, while they played around with the heparin dose to figure out the right level. Today though, he needed some more blood due to his hemoglobin levels again, so he's got a second IV once more. They'll run a CAT Scan soon, too, to make sure he's not bleeding internally somewhere. There's no evidence of that, but we want to be sure. I think it's safe to say he's a bit bored. Did you know RCH has no wifi? We're still trying to wr...

Dan woke up Maggie yesterday morning with a surprise text: YAY! This means while inside Dan, the doc's also extracted a couple lymph nodes. This type of cancer commonly spreads using the lymphatic system. We weren't sure yet if it had begun to metastasize like that or not. Thankfully, it doesn't look like it. Right now, it looks like we've got the best possible outcome of all this, and despite discovering the cancer pretty late, it hasn't spread! Dan could possibly be cancer free! Of course, scans in the near future will determine if this is so or not. And even if Dan is currently cancer free, we'll always have to be wary of it returning in the future, as it unfortunately often does in many cancer patients. We have good access to good doctors though, who will keep us on a tight scanning and testing timeline, so we'll always be checking to make sure. Today Dan is having the chest drain and a few different tubes still left removed. He'll be down...

June 22 was the first World Kidney Cancer Awareness day and everyone was encouraged to take a selfie with green lipstick and tag it #GreenLiptstickChallenge and #KidneyCancer to raise awareness. The main website did a Q and A too, but we ended up being too busy that day to really participate. Whitney brought the girls to the hospital again and this visit went better and lasted longer. Ayla was such a big girl and so brave, and she wasn't quite so scared of all the doctors and patients this time around. She had special green lipstick to put on everyone and followed that up with painting Daddy's nails green. And she had a special cupcake just to share with Daddy that she'd been hanging on to as well. AND - a replacement Father's Day coffee cup, the first having unfortunately broken on their way in to the hospital last Sunday.  We had the girls meet us outside in the Serenity Garden, where Dan could get sunshine and fresh air. The visit did him good. Almost as g...

Dan's been living in Room 314 on floor 3South for a few nights now. If you do want to visit, hit Maggie up with a quick note so she can make sure he's decent. His window sill is filling up with cards and balloons - thank you! The surgery incision and pain have been minor nuisances compared to Dan's back pain and swelling in his legs, due to the decrease in kidney function. The swelling was the worst ... keeping Dan from walking too much, from getting comfortable, etc. THANKFULLY - a couple high notes. Yesterday was a loooong day but it paid off. He had an ultrasound to confirm a blood clot in his leg (which is easily remedied with a change and increase in blood thinners), and an appointment with I.R. - Interventional Radiology to remove the ports in his neck and install what the Renal dudes call a permanent catheter. It's really only slightly permanent, in that it stays in weeks to months, depending on just how long the patient actually needs it. BUT, it works muc...

Today was a much better day for Dan. Dan was moved to the High Acuity Unit (HAU) yesterday due to his hemoglobin levels and constant nausea, which have now righted themselves thanks to four more units of blood and some other TLC. His pain management is going very well and he should soon be transitioned off the PCA IV and to solely oral medication. He received his second round of dialysis, which took three attempts to take this time ... but hey, third times the charm? (In reality, I was a pretty pissy wife about the numerous tries and clotted lines and was pushing for them to find a different entry point ... but anyway ... enough about me ... ) He'll spend the night in HAU again tonight, and move tomorrow to the surgical recovery ward in 3South again. Thankfully! This means the girls can come visit and give him his Father's Day gifts in person. We didn't want them to visit in the HAU due to a number of reasons, but 3South is much more laid back and not as intimidating. ...

Dan would like to share his tumor with you all. Please be forewarned - this is pretty disgusting. Only, and I repeat, ONLY click on this if you're truly interested in what a Stage 4 Kidney Cancer tumor looks like - cut in half, that is. If you do, click on the pomegranate: ... ... Maybe don't be eating anything either. Just sayin'.

Hold on to those singing telegrams. Dan has moved out of the surgical recovery ward and up to the High Acuity Center. We'll let you know more soon.

It's been a rough, sleepless two nights for Dan.  The nurses in the CSICU, as nice as they were, woke Dan up only a few hours after he got there. He didn't get the day or two of sedated sleep to begin healing we were told of. The first night was rough, made more so by spasms in his back due to his history of back pain and a new bed to adjust to, not to mention a new world of pain he's never known before. Getting his lumbar support the following morning helped, and by 11am they finally had the PCA hooked up - Patient Controlled Anathesia. Having the button to push himself whenever he felt the need to helped him get the pain down on the pain scale, and keep it down. Then came troubling news about his remaining kidney. We knew it would take a hit and were warned about the possible need for dialysis, and that is what ended up happening the following morning, today. After yet another rough night of little sleep, mostly due to the noise of a busy CSICU, he was finally mo...

He's out! Dan emerged from the O.R. four and a half hours after going in. Though he was still sedated and will be until tomorrow, his primary surgeon gave us the good news. He considers the surgery a success, finding the kidney and cancerous tumor easy to remove from the IVC and renal gland, with no apparent travelling through hepatic veins (meaning it looks like the liver is safe). Dan needed a lot of blood, which is pretty normal in this circumstance. The IVC did not need replacement, his left kidney wasn't tied off for too long, and all in all ... I am SO relieved I could cry. Again. The doctors also decided to NOT go through Dan's sternum, which he will be very happy to learn about upon waking. They opted for the incision along his side, from the armpit to belly button. It might hurt a bit more in the end we're told, due to the ribs being moved out of the way, but it's the way Dan would have preferred. We got a chance to briefly visit him in the Card...

The Eve of Operation GET TO THE TUMAH. Today, Dan met with a naturopath to talk healing during recovery, and then later with the urologist specialist who's keying the surgery. Surgery happens tomorrow, June 13, at 1pm, at Royal Columbian Hospital. Surgery will be several hours, at the minimum. He might be left under general anesthesia for a few days, so we'll let everyone know when he's awake and moved out of ICU and into a recovery room that accepts balloons and cards that explode glitter. (Kidding. Don't send glitter.) (Sparkles are cool, tho.) Unfortunately, the surgeons have decided that the best course of action is to open up Dan vertically, rather than the hoped for belly button to armpit diagonal direction. This gives the surgeons greater access to Dan's IVC, where the majority of the tumor resides according to the scans, but it also means they're breaking Dan's sternum, which we were hoping didn't have to happen. There is still a lot ...

A few days ago, the crowd funding site to help out with Dan's recovery after surgery went live, at YouCaring:  https://www.youcaring.com/danandmaggiedumouchel-839730 Already, in only a few days, we've seen over $15,000 in donations! Dan and his family are just floored by the generosity of his friends, family and coworkers. What an outpouring of love! We thank you so, so  much. We'll do proper thank you's to everyone individually post-surgery, when Dan and Maggie have time to cuddle (properly propped up on some pillows on the bed in front of the AC) and go through all the notes and donations. Again, we thank you for however you are able to help us out - your thoughts and well wishes, prayers, emails and notes and calls, food delivery and gift cards, or cash donation - each act of love is amazing and Dan is so thankful to have such wonderful, caring people in his and his family's lives. Thank you!

Tricia, Dan's sister, has set up an account at Meal Train  for Dan and Maggie and the girls. Through Meal Train , those that are local to Dan and Maggie can choose a specific night to bring by food to help them out. Of course, if you're not local to the Metro Vancouver area, there are ways around this! UPDATE:  Dan and Maggie have received A LOT of Mamaluv so far - so...perhaps consider other options, just so they don't get loved out by Mama. Mamaluv : You can still block off a night on Meal Train, and then choose to send the food via Mamaluv. Choose the meal(s) from the website and send the gift card direct via email to Maggie and Dan (use maggie.dumo@gmail.com). They use the gift card to select the meal and it gets delivered to their door! Real Meals : Another local site where Maggie and Dan can order food based on the gift card you have sent to them via email. It also gets delivered to their door. Again, a night can be booked off on the Meal Train website. Othe...