Rachel passed her test of the stairs with physical therapy today, so we’ll be going home later today. Rachel’s excited to go home to her own bed.

We’ve been told that Rachel can  go home as soon as the physical therapist clears her as being safe to go home (without risk of falling), which could be as soon as tomorrow. We have a good number of stairs to get into our second-floor apartment, so they need to make sure that she can maneuver those when we get home. She started working with a physical therapist and tomorrow she will test out some stairs.

Rachel had a visit from a pediatric oncologist today, which was a little scary and confusing. We’ve been given every indication that her tumor was benign, but it seems that the oncologists get involved with every case of solid tumors. We have a follow-up visit scheduled with him on December 6, provided we have pathology results by then.

And some good news: Rachel got her first college acceptance letter today – University of Maine!

Rachel had surgery today to remove the tumor on her spine. The neurosurgeon wanted to wait until today so that special spinal monitoring equipment could be brought in for the surgery. The surgery lasted about 4.5-5 hours. They were able to remove all the visible tumor plus some extra bone surrounding the tumor site.

Rachel’s numbness is already quite a bit improved since the surgery, though she still needs a walker to get around. An “At Risk of Falling” sign on her hospital room door serves as a sad reminder.

A pathologist was in the operating room to see if they could tell what type of tumor it was but they were unable to tell without doing tests that take time, so we have to wait, possibly for a few weeks. We were told that it appeared to be benign and slow-growing. Since the pathologist didn’t know what type of tumor it was, the surgeon decided not to put in any stabilizing hardware in her spine because that would make future imaging scans harder to read and this could be something that they need to monitor in the future.

“We found a mass on your spine.” Those were the words spoken to Rachel, my 17-year-old daughter, by the ER doctor last night.

Rachel had been having pain in her upper back near her shoulder blade for a few months. A visit to a nurse practitioner resulted in a diagnosis of a torn rotator cuff and a referral to physical therapy. Having had a torn rotator cuff before and knowing that Rachel had no pain in her shoulder, I knew this was ridiculous and didn’t follow through with any PT. Several visits to a wonderful chiropractor initially seemed to be helping the pain. Her spine appeared to be curving to the right, so it looked like she had some degree of scoliosis and an X-ray of her spine was ordered.

Shortly thereafter, Rachel started having numbness in her chest. This past weekend the numbness got much worse and went from her chest down to her feet, causing great difficulty walking leading us to head to the ER yesterday. Doctors performed some physical neurological tests and sent her for an MRI of her spine, which discovered the mass. They immediately ordered a CT scan of her chest and admitted her to the inpatient children’s unit of the hospital.

One of the medical personnel (not sure if it was a nurse or someone from neurosurgery) told us that the CT scan showed the mass was benign, so now we’re just waiting to see if she’ll have surgery today or tomorrow. And of course, the poor girl hasn’t been able to eat because they aren’t sure if she’s having surgery yet.

Oh, and might I add, happy birthday to me, as today’s my birthday. Not exactly how I wanted to spend it. 😦