HEEEEYYYY!!!

Dana is out of surgery. Dr. T reported that this was a very serious surgery and she is not out of the woods yet. Dana has a long road ahead of her. To continue with our sports theme, the surgery was mile one of the marathon. Things went as well as we could have hoped. Dr. T and the Neurontourage were able to remove the tumor at C6 relatively easily. They were able to remove most of the other tumor. The pathology will not be back for about four days and Dana is expected to be in the hospital for about five days. The tumor was in a tricky location and we will take the recovery one day at at a time.

Molly, Jan, Doug, Carrie and Katie were able to go see her in the recovery room. Dana's first word was a very enthusiastic, "HEEEYYYY!" Dana was in great spirits, very thankful that she could move all of her paws, especially her writing hand. She is in tremendous pain, but dealing with it well. As she said multiple times, I would rather be in pain than numb. Dana was her same old colorful self, cracking jokes, asking about other people, and referring to the exorcism of her gremlin. Dana was thrilled to eat her first ice chips, use some Burt's Bees chappy and see her peeps dressed in pink.

Everyone is letting out a big sigh of relief -- lots of tears of joy, high-fives and fist bumps. Dana should be up to her room on 2 South within an hour.

We did it and we did it together!