Prep for major surgery can be a long, sometimes exasperating ordeal. But these days hospitals work hard to make it manageable. For example, in the family waiting area at Mayo Clinic there’s a wide screen TV monitor much like those used in airports to track flights. Each patient receives a “flight number” and can be followed through the maze of stops along their route.

The monitor’s color-coding makes it easy to see exactly what’s happening to your loved one. White means she’s still in admitting. Orange is posted when she gets called to the operating room. Yellow is for having entered the OR, green for “go-time” on the procedure, grey for a patient in recovery, and pink for the good news that it’s time to leave the surgical floor.

To sign up for an operation is to sign up for lots of waiting. Tense waiting. Waiting when it’s tempting to let your mind wander to places it shouldn’t.

For instance, today at the beginning of Mary’s surgery we all knew the doctor planned to do a brief laparoscopic look-around before beginning the complicated Whipple procedure. That would include a biopsy of the liver, located next to the pancreas. If other cancer was found, the Whipple would have been aborted, and Mary would have been rolled to recovery.

We’d been sitting in the crowded waiting room about 30 minutes when a nurse came in and said, “Peterson family?”

My heart stopped, thinking the worst had happened. But then she said, “We have her room ready, if you’d like to wait there instead of here.” Whew.

This morning as the 5 of us hurried on foot toward the nearby hospital, a whipping wind filled with biting snow didn’t make it easy. Temperatures were in the teens, and it felt good to pass through the revolving doors into the warm lobby of the Mayo Clinic’s St. Mary’s hospital. As always, Mary soldiered through without complaint, despite not being allowed to have a warm breakfast like the rest of us.

The long day was dotted with waiting periods. Since the surgical schedule experienced one delay after another, Mary’s procedure started 6 hours later than originally planned. More waiting. But when the surgeon finally appeared with a report on how everything went, he was smiling. “It went beautifully,” he said, “and she did great.”

Although pathology won’t be complete until Wednesday, Dr. Truty (right) talked of “clean margins” and said he had been able to keep the stomach intact, including the pyloric valve that attaches to the intestines. As with all Whipples, he took out the gall bladder, part of the intestine, the tumor, and the head of the pancreas. He said he was extremely pleased with the results.

When the waiting was over and Mary was finally wheeled into her room at 11:00 pm, we were probably far more excited to see her than she was to see us. Worn out but without pain, enjoying her “happy drugs” and cooperating nicely with the staff, her first words to us were, “Go home and go to bed.” On her nightstand were her Scripture cards, her Bible, and a photo of her with Bervin and their 9 grandchildren.

One of them, 6 year old Beck (front, 2nd from right), had talked to Mary on the phone this morning. Whenever he says goodbye he always says, “I love you to the moon and back!” But this morning he said, “Grandma, I love you all the way to Pluto and back!”

And that BIG love goes for all of us…..

“The desire accomplished is sweet to the soul.” (Proverbs 13:19)

Our prayer requests for Mary:

1. Praise for a safe surgery performed by a skilled surgical team, for negative margins, and a negative liver biopsy
2. Pray for a good night’s rest
3. Praise for excellent caregivers at Mayo Clinic
4. Praise for the commitment and vision of the Franciscan Sisters and physicians who make this a place of healing