Home sick!

OKAY. This is a crazy series of weeks. I got sick on Christmas with a bad cold/respiratory thing/fever. I was sick for about a week, also developing serious intestinal distress that has been hitting for weeks, on and off. This past weekend I was very sick with it and I've had to go to my G.I. doctor. My endoscopy was also put off because I have been sick and they didn't want to risk it (now it's on January 25).

So yesterday I came back to work, worked a lot to catch up, and still am not caught up.

Yesterday I also decided I must have some kind of awful cancer (the pre-cancerous intestinal stuff, the stomach ulcer, and the ongoing side pain coupled with terrible stomach virus or whatever it is made me decide this*). And I had to have my cancer doctor talk me down, which she was kind enough to do. I love her.

Then woke up at 4 this morning (that's nothing new), and my neck LOCKED up in the worst pain ever. I've had herniated disc problems before, but the problems usually affect my LEFT side. This was on the RIGHT. I couldn't move.

I had to stay home this morning and now I've taken three Advils. They are starting to take effect.

Whoosh. What a beginning to 2012!!!


* What I decided is that I have a "gastrinoma" or "gastrinomas."

Intestinal fortitude!

I'm on my way to the GI doctor for preop bloodwork in advance of my endoscopy this Monday. They saw what seemed to be another polyp in September, so now they will look to cut that sucker out (and I suppose whatever else they see that's not kosher). Please wish me luck and think good thoughts. I'm a little concerned that I'm just getting over a cold, but my asthma doc is not overly concerned.

January will be a big medi-cathlon (tm). I will try to keep this page more updated because of that.

Two years!

It's two years, plus, since my original diagnosis!! My, how time flies. Not much new on the thyroid front right now, although I guess another radioactive tracer might be needed at some point soon.

In other news, a couple of folks I know have recently received the same diagnosis I got just before my 36th birthday. Hang tough, you two, and know you can lean on me as needed.

Maybe I should call this "Lisa's Kvetching Blog"

In 2009, the year in which everything seemed to get all wiggy (for lack of a more descriptive term) in the form of life-changing news about my bodily condition, it seemed the diagnoses would keep coming:

•  Obscenely high mercury levels? Check.
• Thyroid cancer? Of course.
• Life-threatening hypocalcemia as a result of the thyroidectomy? Sure.
• Esophageal spasming that felt like a heart attack? Come right in!
• Mysterious pre-cancerous growth in my small intestine? You betcha.

When the diagnoses started piling up, all within a few months of one another, I told myself, "Let's just get through this season and then we'll feel better." I told myself, "Aren't we lucky that we're finding this now, so we don't have to deal with this later? We'll get all the treatment over with and then we'll sail through our thirties." 

This was not my first indication that I like to lie to myself.

Since that time, I learned of a few more medical oddities here and there. Oh, and I broke my shoulder pretty seriously and got lucky enough to take in a bunch of radioactive x-rays... I got some more of that delicious radiation during a barium swallow... and yet more after a fall on my head. (Heck, I don't even have a thyroid to absorb that shit, right? I kid, I kid. When I had the head x-ray, the guy didn't even put a thyroid guard on me; he actually seemed pretty annoyed that I suggested it.)

Anyway, I digress. That last paragraph's worth of digression was just meant to say that, over the year or so after my surgery, a few diagnoses came and went, but I kept telling myself that the big summer of diagnoses, the summer of 2009, was all over, and from here on out, I would be a healthier me. 

In that vein, I recently started seeing a proactive oncologist as part of this quest (basically, someone who doesn't want patients to have cancer, and works with them to avoid recurrences). My oncologist took a pretty thorough medical history (Memo to self: WRITE a medical history and then HAND IT to the doctors at the beginning of each appointment. STAPLE it to their damn questionnaires that take 15 minutes and don't capture anything. Hmmm, I bet other people have thought of this before, people who aren't even professional writers. Well, why didn't they suggest it, then? Bastards.), and the item she felt needed most attention, of those listed above and several others, was the duodenal adenoma.

Off I went to her recommended G.I. doctor, who called me a "walking medical textbook," because of the medical history I'm sure she was sorry she'd asked for. I rattled off issue after issue as she sat taking notes. I am sure she doubted whether she'd see her next appointment.

She sent me for some tests, two of which I just had earlier this week, an endoscopy and a colonoscopy. Well, actually, she did the tests herself. The first results available to me are the ones she saw immediately: a 12-mm (I think) antral, gastric ulcer with heaped-up edges (that even sounds yucky), and a medium-sized duodenal polyp, which she attempted to remove in full. (The doctor who found this the last time had told me he removed it... either that was a lie, or this is a new adenoma; given the overall mediocrity of that doctor in general, and my desire to NOT be sprouting rare polyps in my small intestine, I'm going to say it was a lie.)

Now I'm waiting for my pathology reports, and trying to avoid the trap of feeling like I did back when I got all of those concurrent diagnoses, of endlessly waiting for the next shoe to drop in an endless supply of shoes. This seems such a reactive stance to take for someone who relishes being alive, and yet, there's so little I feel I can proactively do. Again, I am starting to feel as if a code to my body exists, but nobody has it... and yes, I recognize the defeatist tone in that statement.  And I'm trying to avoid the pity-party that I tend to want to have for myself as I await diagnoses (although pity parties with wine and oysters are really fun - thanks, Jim!).

So, yeah, not much on the thyroid front to report, really. As I mentioned - or if I didn't - the tests this past February came out okay. I will, of course, keep you posted here in this blog, originally for that purpose, regarding anything of note related to my thyroid.  I'll also let you know the test results, when I know them, from this most recent battery of tests. If you're still reading, I'd love it if you'd please think cancer-free thoughts for me!

intestinal interlude

I'm preparing for a G.I. workup (tomorrow) to follow up on an adenoma found in the lining of my small intestine. I got that diagnosis the day after the thyroid cancer diagnosis, and my doctors all said to chill until the thyroid cancer was under control. Well, knock on my head (my head representing wood in this case), the thyroid cancer has been under control (as much gone as we can tell it is) for a year, and it's high time (past high time) to be dealing with this adenoma.

Think good thoughts for me, please. If you need me tonight, you'll find me either curled up on the couch, softly groaning, or in the place you'd expect me to be the night before my G.I. workup.

Cramps!

Three out of four limbs cramped up this morning! That must be a hypocalcemic record for me.

I woke up with a terrible cramp in one of my calves and a normal cramp in the other.  I have to stretch my legs in a certain way to make the cramps go away.  Sometimes I leap right up out of bed to make the cramps go, although being launched from a deep sleep immediately onto one's feet on the bedroom floor can be jarring and can cause injury. Sometimes I stay in bed and try to make the cramps go away from some position I can achieve whilst already horizontal.  I chose the latter today. All of this to say, in the instant in which I was 1) waking up suddenly, 2) getting into a position in which I could effectively stretch my legs, and 3) yelping loudly at Jim, I leaned heavily on my left arm... which then cramped up also! OUCH.

Good thing I called Old Dr. Thyroid yesterday (aka, my endocrinologist) and left a message with regards to significantly upping my vitamin D intake.  It seems that no matter how many TUMS I pop, I'm always on the edge of leaping out of bed in pain. And that's just one of the symptoms of hypocalcemia that makes it clear I'm not absorbing this stuff.  However, I think my vitamin D is pretty low, and the calcium won't do anything if I don't up the D.

Speaking of Old Dr. Thyroid, he tells me that my parathyroids will never come back at this point. That's a bummer.

Old Dr. Thyroid also wants to do another round of radioactive iodine, which I think I'm going to just do, and schedule it for January.  On the plus side, it'll be nice to make sure in the scan that "Everything is Illuminated" (thanks, Mr. Foer). On the less-than-plus side, I may be running out of time if I want babies.

Well, I think that's everything. For once I actually beat Jim out of bed (the cramps).  So now I'm going to sit on the couch and gloat until he wakes up.

Happy Friday!

It's been a while!

Goodness gracious, where to begin?

It looks like the last time I updated this blog was way back in June.  Since then, I've done a few things.  I went to two amazing conferences, I broke my right shoulder in a way that quite removed me from my daily activities for several months, and I got married to Jim!

Of course, this is the very abbreviated version of the last nearly-half-year.  Still, I'm not sure how to do such a sweeping update.  Maybe a short, bulleted list?  Updates are as follows:

• My job is excellent.  I like my coworkers and the work I'm doing.  The company I work for treats its employees surprisingly well.  I have a lot of responsibility, I'm being challenged daily, and I routinely get to dress up like an adult.
• My friends are amazing. Old friends - wonderful. New friends - wonderful.  Thank you all for being so present for me over the last year.  And a special shout-out to a small group of women friends who I met a little more than a year ago. For the last year, they have been incredibly supportive. Thank you, ladies. 
• The wedding was absolutely everything I could have hoped it would be, and I am thrilled to be married to Jim. Thank you so much to all of our family and friends who attended!  The honeymoon, in one of our favorite places - Bar Harbor, Maine - was as relaxing as could be.
• On the thyroid front, my doctor is pressing to do another round of radioactive iodine, this one less potent than the last.  He checked me in August and didn't see anything on my ultrasound, nor in my blood work, to concern him.  However, he would like to treat me with iodine.  He says it is an important part of the treatment puzzle.  I will probably go through with it in January, once my vacation/sick days reset.

Those are some of the highlights for the moment. I will try to update again in a more timely manner.