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Denisecol 11-10-2009 12:09 PM

Another newbie...20 plus Adenomas...
Hello Everyone!

These liver message boards are a god-send. I've been trying to find resources for adenomas and I'm not really coming up with much. I don't wish this on anyone but just knowing that others are going through similar situations makes me feel like I'm not going to lose my mind.

Anyways, here's my story: Had some weird symptoms in doc had me have a pelvic ultrasound and they also looked at areas other than my pelvis...they found multiple lesions on my liver and that's when I went to see a liver specialist...there are over 20 tumors growing on my liver...all different sizes but there was a 10cm one, 2 that were 8cm and another that was 6cm. I had a laparoscopic liver biopsy in August, then I got married 2 weeks later and went on a honeymoon. Came back and it was confirmed that they are adenomas. They did shrink a bit but not enough to where my doc felt they were safe. So, I just had another surgery to take a 6cm tumor from my left lobe. Basically, they took a wedge of the liver with the big tumor and grabbed whatever else they could with it. I will then have a portal vein embuluzation (spelling is off I know) where they will stick a needle in my abdomen to the vein that feeds the right side of my liver and deflate it and cut it off from blood flow. Then I will go back in to have the right lobe of my liver resected.

The symptoms I originally went in for are unrelated to the adenomas. I was living my life symtom free before all this and now i feel awful. I thought it was supposed to be the other way around: you feel awful, THEN you do something about it. My liver functioning and tests were all fine which is good. They said they wanted to do the operation because I was healthy and had a healthy liver which would make this all successful. I've always had difficult periods so I've been on BC for about 15 years. No more of that obviously. Condoms are great for honeymoons (please note the sarcasm). My liver surgeon told me I could not wait on this. He said they would eventually bleed because they hadn't shrunk to a normal size. I feel for all of you that had yours rupture. I can't imagine the pain.

As you can all imagine, I am less than happy about all this. I live in Boston so I have access to good care but there have been lots of problems and lots of unaswered questions. My belly looks like a pin cushion and I'm just basically "bleh". Here are the problems/issues I've been dealing with:

--I am eating less and not enjoying food. This is awful as I derive a lot of joy in life from food.
--No one knows if I'll be able to have children after all this. They most likely won't be able to get all the tumors through surgery. I don't want to go through all this if I can't have kids after. What is your experience with all this?
--I'm a week out from the hopsital and while I'm healing rather well, it really is awful to sit here and know I have to go and do it again so soon.
--I'm feeling unatractive. With all the lovely incisions and scars and sitting around in strectchy pants all day, I feel not so pretty. Once again, not how you want to start out a marriage.
--I haven't lost a goodamn pound--how is that possible? I'm not really looking to but I thought it might be an unavoidable bit of luck.
--Feeling pretty worthless/bored/sad because I haven't been working and don't have a whole lot to do. I hate having to make up things to do that don't need to be done. When did you feel like you wanted to go back to work?
--I have the numbing sensations in my stomach that most of you talked about. Does that feeling come back?
--Of course pain and acheness and trying to walk, blah, blah, blah
--Being a burden on friends and family that can't really understand what I'm going through
--Not drinking any alcohol. Not that this is awful but I'd like to have some wine with dinner or a beer sometimes.

So, that's my story. I'm wondering how long you were on pain meds from surgery for? I've been out of the hospital for a week but I'm trying to get a refill and they're acting like it will take an act of God to get this. Ah, the medical community,always looking out for the wellbeing of their patients. Also, I'm downing Ibuprofen like it's my job--is this bad for my liver? All I need is another liver problem!

I welcome any and all questions or comments. I'm so glad I stumbled on this community.
