Wednesday's Appointment with Dr. Cheng

Dear Friends,

Hello, Hannah here. My family is mostly managing this blog, but Mom suggested I update you all on the appointment at Vanderbilt today. Because the surgery is so complex and they needed to assemble a team and make sure they had the facilities available, my surgery is scheduled for July 17th at 8:30am CST. While it was great getting to meet Dr. Cheng, who seemed very knowledgeable and experienced, he was very honest about the risks involved with this type of surgery.The size of my tumor (5cm x 2cm) is unusual, and given its placement at the very bottom of my spinal cord there are a number of complications that can arise. Besides the fact that if the tumor is too close to the cord he might have to remove a small section of the cord itself, Dr. Cheng is quite concerned that the nerves will be too caught up in the tumor. Dr. Cheng said that my risk of nerve damage is pretty high, and he wanted me to know that it's a very real possibility they will either have to leave part of the tumor knowing it will grow back or sacrifice some nerve function. Neither of these is optimal, so please be praying that Dr. Cheng will be pleasantly surprised and the tumor will be easily removed without nerve damage.

In addition to the risk of nerve damage, Dr. Cheng will have to remove a section of bone and possibly joints along my spine to access the tumor, and while he hopes that my spine will stabilize on its own he will have to monitor me after surgery. If my spine doesn't stabilize, he might have to do a bone graft (which would require fusing my bones and prohibit movement in those joints in the future) or place rods and screws in the bones. Between now and the surgery, the immediate concern is for the nerves in the area of the tumor because the tumor could be restricting the blood flow to the nerves and causing damage to the nerve function in the lower half of my body already.

Please Pray:
1) That God will protect my nerves from being damaged by the tumor between now and surgery, and that I don't have any further symptoms (Dr. Cheng said that if any new symptoms arise or my current symptoms worsen they might have to postpone the surgery).
2) That the tests during my pre-op visit with Dr. Cheng's nurse will not make postponing the surgery necessary.
3) That the surgery won't keep me from completing my senior year of college on time. I asked Dr. Cheng and his nurse about the likelihood of me being able to return to school in the fall, and both of them said they were
hopeful I would recover that quickly but they couldn't promise anything. My hope has been all along that if I took the summer to have this surgery and recover I'd be able to go back to school, and the thought that I might have to graduate a semester late is discouraging.
4) Please pray for peace for myself and my family. Now that we have the surgery scheduled, all we can do is wait, pray, and try our best not to worry about all of the possible complications and unknowns. Pray that we will rest in the fact that God brought us here and we are in His keeping.
5) Finally, I would ask you to pray that I would be able to bring glory to God in the midst of everything. The Lord has brought to my mind on many occasions these last few weeks Psalm 19:14, which reads: "May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer." Please pray that my words and heart would be pleasing to God through this time.

Thank you all so much for your prayers. As we sat in the waiting room this morning my dad leaned over and whispered, "Do you know there are hundreds, maybe thousands of people praying for us?" Your love and
encouragement has been such a blessing to us all, and we can't thank you enough. May God bless you for loving us so well.

Hannah for the Lee Family