If you know us then you most likely got an email from us asking, begging, pleading to buy popcorn from Christian for the scouts. The sales are now over and he did well. First we did site sales at Raleys. He had fun doing it, though it lasted a bit too long for the 7 year old attention spans. However, by doing those site sales he gets into his "scout account" 30% of his individual sales to do scout stuff with instead of 15%. Nice!!
Then we went off to to do individual sales --- his personal goal was $600!! That's a lot of popcorn! We went out with Zachary and took turns selling door to door. They did great, Christian was really into selling and trying to upsell... He convinced a few families to buy the $40 collection. Nice! We went out a couple of more times and in the end he made about $400 going door to door.
Several of you also stepped up and helped out as I sent email to friends and co-workers about buying popcorn or sending popcorn to the troops. Christian earned another $175! Then I had to put in my order... I brought his total up to over $650...
So here are the rewards he's earned from the sales:
Popcorn Patch (for selling at least 1 item)
Military $100 club (for selling over $100 in military donations)
The last piece of information we needed to know in order to gauge how serious Jedi's mass was came in today - the biopsy results. This would indicate whether or not he has cancer...
So the mass turned out to be what I expected --- It is (was) a hematoma, the best of all cases! Basically, it was a large, grapefruit-sized blood clot attached to his spleen. With the removal of his spleen and the mass the procedure was curative of any concern related to the mass. Phew!
Jedi is recovering well. He hasn't paid any attention to his incision, he is walking around normally and has returned to his normal self. The sutures/staples should be removed on Friday and then he should also be done with his meds --- and that'll be another test, how does he feel off of his meds.
I know I've been remiss in my duties at keeping Jedi's status up to date, but here you go...
So visting hours are from 12-2 and 7-9 --- From 12-2 Christian is in school and from 7-9 on Tuesday we would have soccer practice. However, the soccer coach sent an email around 3pm that he was stuck in LA with plane delays and practice would be cancelled!! So when I picked up Christian I talked to him about visiting Jedi and Christian was very excited to do it. I was glad to see that, we do love our Jedi!
We left the house around 6:30 and got there just before 7. It didn't matter, they let us back there and Jedi looked GREAT!! Much better than I thought he would do 24 hours after his surgery. He was excited to see us, standing up and walking around. He did not have an e-Collar on (the cone of shame) as he wasn't bothering his incision/staples and he was under 24 hour monitoring. He was eating regular food, drikning water, pooping and peeing all the normal things! We took him out back on a leash and he was walking fine, though he was sedated to keep him calm. It stunk pretty bad back there so we took him back and just sat with him a bit, then took him out front. After about 20-30 minutes with him we left and went home (too close to bed time). It made both of us feel a lot better that he was doing so well!
The next day (Wednesday) around noon I got the call that Jedi could go home. I picked him up and got the care instructions - 2 pills 3 times a day; 1.5 pills 3 times a day; reduce his food intake to lose weight; monitor to make sure he's eating, drinking, pooping and peeing. Light walks to relieve himself are okay, but nothing that causes him to exert himself - light, short and easy. When unsupervised he needs to be confined to prevent any exertion and he needs to wear an e-Collar just in case he decides the incision/staples are bugging him. He also had an incident before I picked him up - they took off his IV tubes (he hadn't used the IV since Monday night anyway) and put tape on the hole where the needle was... Well, he didn't like the tape and chewed it off and apparently ate some of it. They made him throw up, but it dodn't come up. So now there is concern that he may not pass the tape through his system - oh great!!
Now it's Saturday and he's been doing great overall. Each day he is more and more himself. He still hasn't touched the incision, though when gone for more than 30 minutes I do put the Collar of Shame on him. Thankfully we have a soft disc and not the traditional collar - he doesn't like things over his head. Having to wear the collar over night has kept me up a bit as he rubs it against the bed sometimes... Oh well. 1 more week to go and he should have the staples removed and wouldn't need the collar any more.
Today I took Jedi down to the surgical center and met with surgical team. They indicated they surgery is performed a lot and the only real complications they encounter (and rarely at that) are heart arrythmias during or within 24 hours of the surgery and excessive bleeding. But they reassured these rarely happen and they monitor for the arrythmias overnight. They would keep him for 2 days or so depending on how things go. They reviewed the X-Rays with me, and agreed that they saw no visible problems in his bones or joints, they saw no signs of cancer, though that doesn't mean it isn't and that overall he appears healthy. They gave me the estimate and said they could do that afternoon. So I agreed.
Around 5:30 this evening they called as the surgery was over and everything went well. They removed the mass (and spleen) and said the extra mass was the size of a grapefruit and they're sending it off for a biopsy. They also sent off a portion of his liver and pancreas as they showed some lesions, though they felt they were not cancerous they wanted to be sure. So the hard part is over, the surgery is done, healing has started and now we need to wait until I bring him home and for the biopsy results.
When he does come home I've been told he'll be walking fine and be okay to do whatever he feels like - just don't let him jump or run and take it easy.
Today was Jedi's ultrasound and the news is more or less good for Jedi and bad for my wallet...
Overall, no evidence of cancer yet...
The tumor itself - does not look like any of the 3 conditions I previously mentioned - though it still could be any of them. It does not have the shape of a hemangiosarcoma, which is good, but it does not rule out other sarcoma's (malignant tumors).
Kidneys - normal shape, no lesions
Liver - normal shape, no lesions, but there is diffuse hypoechoic mottle (what this means, I don't know, just quoting the dianosis). I'm guessing this means that the US showed something but not something normal but also not something they were looking for. Good/bad - I don't know, either do they. Probably nothing, they believe it is caused by a benign disease.
urinary bladder - distended without lesions
Other organs - normal
Heart - though not normally checked he did take a quick look at it, normal.
So what's next?? Surgical evaluation. He is being referred down to the Veterinary Surgical Services group in Sacramento. We have an appointment Monday morning and they said if everything looks good and this is how we want to proceed then they can keep him for a couple of days after the appointment and get it done. Otherwise I would just bring him back when/if I decide to do it. Estimated cost of the surgery is $2800 - 4000 depending on how things go and if there are any complications.
Here is the X-Ray image of the mass - at least I believe that is his spleen and mass --- the spleen should be about a third of that size or smaller:
