It's not a certainty yet, so we still must hope for better news. The thing is we all (including him, I think) thought it was a black or white issue, that is, he would survive the surgery and come back to his normal self OR he would not survive the op. It never occurred to us that there might be a different result so it has come as quite a shock. I think, had he died during the procedure, or had the procedure just not worked, we were preparing ourselves for the worst result. But now, we have been reminded that there are worse things than dying. But it hasn't definitely come to that yet, so we wait and hope.