When I relapsed in 2015 the Oncologist talked to me about a few treatment options. He ended by saying I could take a day or two to talk it over with Lindsey and make a decision. It was important to me at that moment to let him know there is no stopping to think about it. I told him, “I don’t care what it is. I don’t care how much it hurts. I don’t care how long it takes. I don’t care how sick I get. Whatever you think gives me the best chance of survival my answer is ‘yes, that is what I want to do.’ There is no need to talk or think about it.” In hindsight I made a tad bit of an error there. Not that my words or intent were incorrect. I was 100% all in. It’s just I should have appended one little sentence to that statement.

The Super Bowl
With apologies to my Boston based friends/co-workers and any other Patriots fans, I’m not watching the Super Bowl. Neither team interests me. I suppose Sam Darnold winning it all would be a good story. The Patriots winning would be nothing new. Some of my family is rooting for the Patriots. I just can’t. My daughter asked me if there was a situation in which I would ever cheer on the Patriots. My response? “Honey, the devil himself could be playing the Patriots and I still wouldn’t be cheering for them.” Not that I’d be rooting for the devil. I’d just sit that game out much like this one.

Alternative Plans
So what will I be doing instead? Well that gets us back to my “oops” in 2015. Lindsey and I will be staying in a hotel next to IU Health North. That is where my surgery is. Had I had the foresight to be a bit more specific in 2015, maybe we wouldn’t need to do this. But again, mea culpa. You see, we have to be at the hospital at 5 am. My surgery is at 7 am. And while I get up before 5 for flights and 500 mile races, it would just be nice if there wasn’t one more inconvenience in this whole process. If only I had ended my 2015 statement with “as long as it is after 8 am,” maybe the universe would have heard me and taken a bit of mercy this time around. Oh well.

testicular TORSion
I remember learning about testicular torsion in a wilderness survival class. Apparently when you can’t call 911 or make it to an ED this is a level of pain and risk that requires immediate attention. I mean, you could lose a nut. And that’s why I keep trying to remind myself that there are worse situations to be in than having TORS (transoral robotic surgery). Let’s leave the testicular ion part out and talk a bit about TORS.

Transoral Robotic Surgery
For my far right friends out there, don’t worry. The “trans” in transoral just means the robot performs the surgery by going through my mouth vs. a different method. Apparently that different method used to involve breaking the jaw bone for access to the tumor. Once again, I’m thankful for modern medicine.

A few parts of my past are colliding here. First, the surgery is at IU Health North. Fka Clarian North. And I helped open Clarian North in 2005. Along with that, I did quite a bit of work in the North ED. And quite a bit of eating in the North cafeteria. If you know you know.

The second and third parts involve two different eras of my past. The first again being in 2005 at the same hospital opening. The surgical suites had an Intuitive Surgical Da Vinci robot. A bit groundbreaking at the time, they had a demo robot in the main lobby. Meaning you could walk up to the robot and try your hand at operating it. You weren’t doing actual surgery of course. I think it was something like picking up little rubber hair ties and putting them on specific things. Either way, I sucked at it.

And then the 3rd and final part is that I actually had Intuitive Surgical as a customer for a bit. I got to travel to their headquarters in the bay area and see how the robots were made and repaired.

Where is My Cancer?
So that’s enough of a trip down memory lane. Let’s get to the details. I have a 1.9 cm x 1.9 cm mass in my right Vellecula. Which kind of sounds like Dracula. But wooden stakes don’t work here. In addition to this tumor, I also have a 2.4 cm x 3.9 cm a bit further down my neck. It abuts my sternocleidomastoid muscle. There is a risk of injuring cranial nerve 11 while removing the tumor. If that happens I lose some movement in my right shoulder and neck.

The smaller tumor is the one that will be removed by the robot. The bigger tumor is the one where they do the neck dissection. Alas I will have no cool scare on my neck. Apparently they cut under the jaw bone so any scarring is hidden. Too bad. I could have made up a really good story about that scare.

The Actual Surgery
Basically after they knock me out, they use an expander to keep my mouth open and the put that tube at the end of the robot arm into my mouth. Out of the tube comes different tools that articulate, move things out of the way, cut, burn, grab, etc. I made the mistake of looking up TORS on youtube. I was picture a very precise surgery. Kind of like if you were to cut a shape out of a piece of paper with scissors. I just thought the doctor would see my tumor. Quickly cut around it and be done.

In fact it it a bit more gruesome than that. So I’m just going to use this nice cartoonish picture of the throat and tongue with a few of the surgical instruments they use with the robot. There is a lot of tearing and cauterizing that is just not fit for a blog with family-ish content. What was someones throat basically ends up looking like you took a blow torch to it. I guess that’s why it’s so painful after.

Post Surgery
This isn’t one of those surgeries where you wake up and go home. For me, “home” will be the ICU for a couple of nights. During surgery they will place an NG tube (feeding tube) through my nose and into my stomach. This is the fail safe way for me to receive nutrition. Should I not be able to take liquids orally, they’ll feed me through the tube. In the ideal scenario they take the tube out before I go home. Although it is possible I will go home with the NG tube still inserted and continue to “eat” formula.

And That’s It
There’s not much more to say on this one. Arrive early. Cut out the cancer. Have horrible pain in my throat. Eat through a tube. And eventually go home. I’ll try to write an update tomorrow night. And then recovery lasts for multiple weeks so that will be a good time to get caught up on how exactly we got to this point. This definitely wasn’t something I had on my 2026 bingo card.