Young mom of 3 has cancer for the 2nd time

Hi. My name is Cathee. I am fundraising for my daughter Shira, heres her story.

So finally after over 2 weeks of waiting and calling the office, she got in to see the new surgeon up at OHSU. She was scheduled for February 13th at 11:30.

We talked with the doctor/surgeon, Dr Lim for over two hours. He asked a lot of questions and gave us a lot of information. He went over her symptoms, and if she was in any pain, he also went over the previous ultrasound and two biopsies that she has had. Then he did an ultrasound in office to see the left side of her thyroid, and the one left side lymph node he found the cancer had spread to. While doing that he used the ultrasound and went to the right side of her neck where he found more cancer, it once again spread. He said it is not very common to have left side thyroid spread to your right side lymph nodes, but it does happen. So after the ultrasound, he asked if he could go ahead and do a biopsy right there or if I wanted to wait and schedule it for another day. She told him she wanted the biopsy right now. He did the biopsy and results came back immediately as pathology was standing there with us, and the results came back that not only is the cancer in the left side of her thyroid, but it is in the one left lymph node and now it has spread to the right side lymph nodes, plural! So instead of going in for the surgery that originally would’ve been the removal of half of her thyroid, it has now turned into a surgery that is very serious and very complicated. She could be under Anastasia anywhere from 6 to 8 hours. He will be doing a complete thyroidectomy, the left side lymph node removal as well as any and all lymph nodes on the right side of her neck. She will then will stay in the hospital for at least one night, then anywhere between one month and three months after surgery she will go back to the hospital and be given radiation,and will need to stay in the hospital with no visitors for 5 to 7 days. She cant be around her children, or pets. He did mention that the thyroid is up against the vocal cord, and what will need to be done is a central neck dissection where he dissects the thyroid from the vocal cord. He will get as close as he can with the scalpel to the vocal cord hopefully without damaging the vocal cord. If he happens to slightly nick the vocal cord when he is dissecting the cancer it could permanently damage her voice and may not be able to talk, and I may need a trachea for the rest of her life. Then the right side, the lymph nodes are clustered in with her jugular, carotid artery, vagus nerve, and many other structures. She could end up with, numbness in her face, not being able to lift her arms all the way, or even as far as death! Unfortunately cancer doesn't grow alone, it likes to weave itself around parts we need.

Right now we are still waiting for insurance to approve treatment.