My dad had surgery yesterday at The Cleveland Clinic.
As I was not allowed to go to his doctors appointments from diagnosis up to surgery (he and his wife's rules), I learned yesterday, post surgery, that his was a Stage IV, SCC
I believe he has 3 flaps. One upper back right to help with bone deterioration from the IMRT 4 years ago. I also learned that it spread to the floor of his mouth, thus a 2nd flap there. He was supposed to have his jawbone removed, but they only took 1/2 of it they said. He was also to have a flap internally and externally in right cheek area, but they were able to leave the external portion and use a 3rd flap inside his cheek. I also learned yesterday that he had a radical neck dissection, many nodes involved.

I need to vent safely for a minute, please. . .

UGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Why do some people feel they have to keep their loved ones in the DARK????? My dad knows I deal better when I know the truth and can empower myself with knowledge, then I feel I have some small bit that I can control. Everything feels so out of control for me now. I was prepared to see my dad for a minute with a trach, a respirator, drain tubes, etc..., but I was not prepared for the unbandaged radical neck dissection. How could he do that to me??? I feel that to leave your 43 year old daughter and only child in the dark is the most selfish, cold hearted thing a parent could do. I don't bawl and get all emotional on him, so why would he have done that? (would that really be a bad thing to allow me to share a good cry with him about it?) He told me it was stage 1. He said a couple of lymph nodes were involved. He didn't tell me about the radical neck dissection. HE LIED TO ME. HE DECEIVED ME. Didn't he realize I would finally find out AFTER surgery? I am fed up with being his only child and the black sheep of the family. I am a successful career woman with a degree, single mother of a fantastic son turning 18 next Thurs., and am treated like crap by my family.
I'm fed up with the don't tell anybody mentality. Like that will make it go away. I'm sick of the HIPPA privacy act being used against family members, flesh and blood family members who have a vested emotional intetest. I am an adult, I have not needed to be protected from the truth for a very long time. I am the only family member to carry his genes. The very genes that one day may turn this dreadful disease on me.

Thanks to their lies and deceit, my journey through this with him is much more difficult than I ever imagined. God help me.