Not the best news, but also not the worst

I know everyone has been waiting to hear what happened today and I thank you for giving us time to get home and process a little bit about what we learned.

Surgery is our only option. Leaving Morton "as is" would only allow it to grow and eventually it would have fatal side effects. We can control the symptoms with medications (seizures) but there is only enough room in Rion's head for Morton + his brain, eventually he will lose brain functions and suffer from seizures if we do nothing. His life expectancy will be "greatly reduced" if we do nothing.

So that leaves us with surgery. Dr. Friedman was very upfront with the risks associated with surgery- permanent memory loss, speech disruption, weakness on the left side, infection, anesthesia and bleeding...this is not "routine" surgery by any means. Rion would be put under anesthesia and an incision would be made on his head, the skin would be pulled back and part of his skull would be removed. At this point Rion would be woken up because they need to stimulate the parts of the brain they are cutting on with electrical impulses to determine exactly the effect their cuts will have. The surgery would last around 3-4 hours. The doctor plainly stated "this is not a cure," he will try to remove as much of Morton as possible but it is certain that 100% can't be removed because it is so integrated with his brain. Once the tumor is removed & biopsied, it will be decided if Rion needs to continue with chemo or radiation to combat what is left over.

We walked away with the understand that surgery is our only option, it is not a cure, there are substantial risks and we won't know any more about the prognosis until after surgery.

Words can't describe what we are feeling right now. We are struggling to give this over to God and let Him take control. We are scared and unsure what is going to happen. We have not scheduled a date for surgery yet but we must do so by next Tuesday. The doctor is willing to wait until after the 1st of the year at the latest to allow our insurance to take effect.

Thank you all for your thoughts and prayers as we move forward with this difficult decision. We are leaning toward surgery since that is our only option and we pray that God will take the fear from us and give us comfort that He is with us always.

In Christ,

Emily & Rion