Lily's Journey- Part 1: Lily Has A Tumor

Lily at Dr. Devaro's office

I treated Lily to ice cream for being so good for the MRI

It's funny how certain dates stay with you. They mark the important dates in your life. Most of them are joyous occasions. Some of them are not. I will remember May 8, 2019 forever. That is the day I got the call that Lily had a tumor. 

A little back story. About two years ago, we noticed Lily's right eye slightly wandered when she was tired or not focused. We took her for an eye exam and we were told she had strabismus, an eye condition which the eyes do not align with each other and a slight astigmatism. She was prescribed glasses. 

After the first year, we didn't really notice an improvement in her eye but the doctor didn't seem too concerned. We had also had others in my family ask me about her eye. There was just something that wasn't sitting well with me. Call it mother's intuition. 

Fast forward to May of this year. I decided to seek another eye doctor's opinion and he recommended me to a pediatric ophthalmologist. We had our appointment with Dr. Devaro on May 7th. We were in his office for a couple of hours doing various tests. From what he could see, her vision was good and her optic nerve was healthy. But he was concerned about the bulging (proptosis) and ordered a MRI. I asked him what could be causing her condition and he just told me "we won't know until the MRI results". 

Up until this point I still wasn't alarmed. I still didn't think it was a tumor. I didn't know what it could be to be honest. Dr. Devaro's office called me the very next day and asked if we could bring Lily in for the MRI. I think the sense of urgency for the MRI alarmed me because I figured we would just schedule one the following week. 

May 8, 2019. I took Lily for her MIR at 10 am. It took about 45 minutes. Lily wasn't a huge fan of laying super still and definitely didn't like when the nurse had to poke her to inject the dye. After it was done I figured we would get the results in a couple of days at the earliest. I dropped Lily off at the house and drove back to work. It was around 2:00 pm . I was just getting settled back at my desk when my my phone rang. 

Dr. Devaro was on the other line. I was not prepared for what he told me. I felt like he was talking so fast and then the call was over. He told me he appreciated me taking Lily to get her MRI so soon and then he broke the news. The MRI showed Lily had a large tumor behind her eye. It was pretty concerning and that he wanted us to come into the hospital the next day to meet with Dr. Brown, an oncologist. He said it was serious and that he was sorry. The next step was to get more scans and to get a biopsy done so we could identify what kind of tumor this was and if it was contained or not. I don't even remember if he said anything else.

After I got off the phone, I immediately broke down in tears. The ugly crying ensued and I was inconsolable. TUMOR? ONCOLOGIST? 

My mind started to think for the first time, does Lily have CANCER?