After a while, the nurse came back in and said the doctor wanted me back in the operating room. My heart sank. She said that I was apparently still positive. This time I was put in a different operating room. She pumped twenty more shots of Lidocaine in my nose, but I only felt a few, and those weren't too bad.
When the doctor came in, he said there was a diminishing amount of the cancer that went into a curved root-like shape, apparently towards the top instead of the rim of the nostril, which he said was a good thing. He went back in with the instruments, and this time I could tell he was digging deeper. It was unpleasant but not painful. He said that he would check to make sure we had gotten it all this time, but that I would not longer be satisfied with letting the wound heal naturally as now it was a deeper hole. He also said that stitches would pull my nostril up and cause a deformity, which was not acceptable. At this point, he said, the best option was a graft from my ear, which I did not relish as it meant more shots and another wound on my face. I was beginning to have the sensation that my face was disappearing, chunk by chunk, and it was unsettling. I was dismayed and looked over at my husband. Thank goodness he was there all the time.
They took us back into our private waiting room, the exam room. This part was difficult, waiting to see what the outcome would be, hoping they wouldn't have to go back in for more. If I had not done Mohs, I think a larger part of my nose would be gone. I was falling to despair a bit, but did not allow myself to sink. I read some more, drank water and ate my granola bar. By this time it was around noon, and I was worried that our dog had been locked up this long. So my husband went home to let him out for a while and then he came back. Nothing happened while he was gone. I just waited and read.
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