Troy underwent his laryngoscopy this morning. Basically they inject a special gelfoam into his vocal flap (vocal chord) since the chord was temporarily paralyzed during surgery. He is on voice rest. The doctor said that he could speak conservatively, but the less he speaks the better. This should be interesting! He has a pad and paper and of course "the look"! We are still working on the sign language.
According to what we have been told, his voice will sound hoarse and probably somewhat different that his normal voice for about 6 months. After that, the hope is that the paralyzed flap will heal and work properly again. There is a chance that it won't and his voice will always be different, but the doctors do expect it to correct within the next 6 months. Troy says he hopes he ends up with Kris Kristopherson's speaking voice, but not his singing voice!
He's still doing great. The doctors are all very pleased with his progress. They had planned to remove his chest tube today but the doctor that did the procedure this morning did not want it removed prior to his work because there is always a chance that it will need to be re-inserted and they didn't want to take a chance on that happening during the procedure. We will find out later what the plans are for the chest tube. As uncomfortable as it is, Troy would rather them leave it alone for now. He says he's been through enough for one day!
Still nothing from pathology. Looks like we won't get those results until Monday.
I am so happy with Troy's progress. Seeing how well he has handled the surgery has encouraged me. I realize that he still has a long hard recovery ahead of him, but this surgery was definitely a major milestone in his recovery. I thought I knew how much I loved him until we had to face this terrible disease called cancer. It has definitely forced me to look at our lives and realize that my hopes and dreams are entwined with his. I can't imagine a life without him in it. Hopefully God will grant us lots of years together and many adventures yet to come! (OK - enough of the sappy stuff... well, maybe just one more sappy quote)!
If you press me to say why I loved him, I can say no more than because he was he, and I was I. ~Michel de Montaigne
