Not the best news...

...but not the worst either.

Thursday our pathology came back on Brian's tumor. I just couldn't post that day because I was very upset as this was not the news we had hoped for. Brian's tumor is called an oligoastrocytoma. It originates from two cells in the brain, oligodendroglial cells and astrocytes. Stages I and II are considered low grade and III and IV are high grade. We were hopeful that we were looking at a low grade tumor since the initial pathology came back low grade, but as I mentioned, Dr. Tsung said there were some suspicious areas. Unfortunately Brian's tumor is stage III which constitues high grade.

I feel like we keep getting to these forks in the road with good news in one direction and bad news in the other. At first after the seizure and CT they said it could just be an infection, or it could be a tumor, and it was a tumor. Then it could be a totally benign tumor or it could be malignant, and its malignant. Then it could be low grade or high grade and its high grade. Its frustrating to keep getting the bad news, but after a few days of processing, and seeing Brian improve so quickly after surgery, I have my hope back.

Some good news is that this is a primary brian tumor which means that it originated in the brain and did not metastasize from somewhere else. We are still trying to decide if we want to do a full work up with Brian's Primary Care Physician just to be sure, but our doctor's are certain that because of the cell type we don't have to worry about cancer anywhere else.

Our next step will be to meet with both a medical oncologist and a radiation oncologist in a couple weeks. As usual, I feel overwhelmed by this sudden life change, but I am so grateful for the support of our family and friends. I haven't made a meal this week and we have had so much yummy food! Brian's parents left for Virginia early this morning, but I know they will be back and forth a lot in the coming months. It was nice to have some company and Brian's mom was so helpful keeping the dishes and laundry caught up so I could just come home and be with Brian.

We are also grateful for the cards and phone calls. Its fun to get stuff other than bills in the mail!

I am going to wrap up for now. Joe, one of my dearest friends asked if he could take us to dinner tonight so we are going to get out of the house for awhile and have some fun.

Thank you for your continued prayers.

Lindsey