Friday Noon

I've spent a little awake time with her this morning; but she's finally getting some much needed sleep, so I'm trying to stay out of her room unless she asks for me.  They actually had her out of bed a while ago for some brief physical therapy.  She thinks she's going to spend one more night in ICU before going to a regular room.

Earlier, I ran into one of the surgeons in the hallway, and he had just come from checking on her.  He is very pleased with her facial movement.  Apparently, the tumor had squished the facial nerve down to the depth of a piece of tissue paper, and the nerve was almost indistinguishable from the tumor.  It sounds like they had to rely on the facial nerve monitor to tell them when they were hitting tumor and when they were close to the nerve.  They spent six hours trying to resect just the last centimeter.  Delicate stuff.  I think the surgery took a total of about eleven hours.

Even though the nerve was firing well when they closed, they're usually not really sure whether it's going to function for a couple of days. But Julie's facial movement thus far is making the doctors think she's well on her way.  We should expect dramatic improvement over the next couple of weeks, then it will plateau and continue to improve to normal function over a period that may take a few months.  He says her positive attitude is helping tremendously.