My Pituitary: home from hospital and doing well

Officially it's called an adenoma

You can Google Non-Functioning Pituitary Adenoma if you want detailed information but in a nutshell it’s a benign tumor in my pituitary gland.

Three times, it's grown to the point where it affected my optic nerves and pituitary function. Surgery was performed Feb. 2007 again in Feb. 2009 and yet again Nov. 11, 2010 to remove as much of it as possible.

My vision was preserved in each case however I've lost Growth Hormone production and am on thyroid medication to help those levels.

I had radiation after my last surgery. The risk is I could over time loose all pituitary function. The hope is it will slow or stop the persistent tumor's aggressive growth.

3/2/09

home from hospital and doing well

Dr. Delashaw believes he got most of my tumor. Won’t know how much remains until the follow up MRI in May.

I had a cerebral spinal fluid leak, a complication that kept me in hospital a couple days longer. A drain was placed at bottom of my spine to drain off spinal fluid to keep pressure off the leak until it repaired itself. Three days of sitting up in bed only allowed to move if nurse assisted sucked. Horrific headaches that increased dramatically after any movement, so for three days I remained mostly still. Sunday afternoon they finally removed the drain and nasal packing. It felt amazing to move, lay down and breath through my nose.

Last Monday afternoon I came home. I'm doing okay. As expected I'm sleepy, tired and have throbbing headaches that haunt me but every day is better than the one before.

Have appointment Friday, the start of several endocrinology appointments to see how my pituitary is functioning.

1 comment:

sheandeen said...: Lori, glad to hear you're home and doing pretty well. Keeping you in my thoughts and prayers. Nancy AKA sheandeen; March 3, 2009 at 12:52 PM