After two weeks of excruciating pain and discomfort coming out of cancer surgery to remove a tumour on his liver, Dean Coleman had his first real good day Friday.
The 46-year-old real estate agent/fitness gym co-owner was in a good mood resting on his couch at home and joked about the 14-inch incision needed for the procedure he had Dec. 3 in Vancouver. It runs from his waist to his sternum and he got out a tape measure and determined one of the scars is eight inches long, while the other is six inches.
“It’s huge, it looks like a big ‘L,’” said Coleman. “It’s a good thing I’m not in high school. They’d be calling me a loser.”
No chance of that for the popular co-owner of The Movement Group Fitness gym in College Heights. The story of Coleman’s second bout with the disease, eight years after he beat lung cancer with his first round of surgery, touched off a wave of emotion and support from the local community to help him keep the doors of the family business open. A GoFundMe page started by fitness instructor Kimberly Sexsmith has so far collected nearly $35,000 and donations continued to arrive this week following Coleman’s return to Prince George on Wednesday.
The scar will be permanent reminder of what his doctor in Vancouver believes was successful four-hour operation to remove a 15-centimetre Stage 4 neuroendocrine tumour from his liver. The disruption of his surgery to his internal organs and the drugs needed to accomplish the procedure at Vancouver General Hospital delivered a knockout punch to his digestive system and it stopped working for him while he recovered in his hospital bed. The condition is known as ileus and is a common side-effect of surgery. It resulted in a buildup of gas and liquid and it kept Coleman with tubes inserted through his nose into his stomach to alleviate the pressure. He was back on solid food for the first time Friday, when he had an egg, piece of bread and some fruit.
Dean and wife Janna surprised their two young daughters, nine-year-old Kenlee and 11-year-old Maija, when they flew back Wednesday morning and came home a day earlier than they promised.
While he still has to have a PET (positron emission tomography) scan to check his body and follow-up injections to inhibit cancer cell growth, Coleman is encouraged by his prognosis.
“There is a ton of follow-up but I think the liver that’s left looks really healthy,” he said. “I know it’s a pretty big chunk of the liver they removed. The surgery outcomes were good and the CT scans were positive. The surgeon seems confident.”
Coleman says he’s had to take the initiative to stay on top of his after-surgery care, making calls to doctors and researching on his own what he needs to do to get back to health. He lost 16 pounds in the hospital was told not to lift anything for four weeks and that it would take 12 weeks to get back to physical activities. He’s going to try to shrink that recovery time to eight weeks before he’s back to mountain biking and water activities. He admits he’s missing his daily workouts.
“It’s huge, it gives your energy and self-confidence and how fast you lose (fitness) just blows my mind,” he said. “The big thing for me is going to be that journey back to fitness.”
