The Kleinlein Family

Meghan came out of the surgery successfully. She went in at 4:30pm and was supposed to come out at 7:30pm. At 8:45pm, Stephan and I were starting to have rising feelings of panic but they were relatively unfounded. The surgery was a bit of a spectacle: The tumor had not actually repaired it's walls from the cauterization, it had, instead, grown a membrane over the damaged hole which allowed it to re-deposit fluid back within itself. This membrane was like a window into the tumor and it had to be punctured in order to access the tumor. Dr Butler then used a larger, more invasive cauterizer and did some significant damage to the tumor wall. This time there was significant bleeding from the tumor and it took 9 liters of saline to halt the flow of blood--this is what added so much more time to the surgery. Will the tumor be able to re-grow another membrane and rebuild itself once more? Obviously preventing the regrowth of the membrane/tumor wall will be the focus of our prayers.
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Meghan came out of the surgery with an external drain from her brain. The surgeon was suspicious that she has a type of hydrocaphaleus where the arachnoid villi (little valves) no longer allows CSF fluid to pass from the brain into the blood stream. If this happens, there is too much CSF fluid in the head which causes increased pressure. The amount of fluid plus monitoring her pressure will tell the neurosurgical team if a shunt is needed.
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If anyone is craving their "15 minutes of fame" we encourage you to share ours. We are so tired of being a complex, fascinating, intriguing medical case. Meghan and I agree: We long for obscurity.