Hello ALL! It has been quite awhile since I have posted a new blog. Things have been a but crazier than usual in the home front. These past few days and upcoming ones it has been doctors, doctors and more doctors :) Oh joy! As mentioned in my first blog, I was diagnosed with Papillary Thyroid Carcinoma (thyroid cancer) in August of 2009. My entire life I was never skinny. I was never able to lose weight. I was tired, run down, my hair was falling out, and my nails were brittle. I never had insurance so I could not afford to go to the doctor.The price of being poor I guess. Once myhusband joined the military and for the first time in my adult life I had insurance so I finally went. That is when I found out. From the get go I was labeled an "unusual case"which can sound a bit scary but it also gets a lot of big doctors interested in your case.
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One of my first reports.
This cancer typically is a very slow growing cancer and rarely spreads. It usually doesn't hit women until they around the age of 45 and 99% of people have goiters on their thyroids with 99% of those goiters being benign. For me I was 22, it was almost 3 inches large and I had a total of 56 tumors/lymph nodes removed from my neck. I had to have two surgeries to remove it all. I spent around 14 hours under the knife. Most thyroidectomies leave a small scar (about the size of a toothepick) across the base of your neck (in between your collar bones) Mine almost made a complete circle around my neck. Neighbors joked around that it appeared that I had try to hang myself with fishing line and that I had already had the perfect Halloween Costume haha! I joke around a lot about this because my entire life is such a catastrophe that honestly I (or anyone for that matter) cannot help but to laugh. Anyway, I received a large dose of Radioactive Iodine 150mci to be exact.That sounds fun doesn't it? That is a strange experience. The technician brings in this iron canister that is marked as biohazard. He is wearing gloves and picks up the tablets with tweezers then places them in one of those paper medicine cups. After that he instructs you not to touch |
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| The garbage bag in my isolation room |
the tablets. Seriously? I am not supposed to touch it with my fingers but I am supposed to ingest it? Right. After that I stayed in isolation for a week while following a low Iodine Diet (which is probably the worst diet ever) After that ordeal I was in the clear, it would seem we had got it all. Then in July in 2010 while my husband was deployed in Afghanistan, I was given the crushing news. My cancer was back. I was alone with 3 children and I was sick. Ugh well talk about perfect timing. We biopsied a few lymph nodes in my neck but they all came back benign. We knew it was somewhere on the right side of my neck but couldn't pinpoint where exactly. So instead of surgery I received another large dose of RAI, this time 197mcis.. I did another Low Iodine Diet --this time was worse than the last one. I missed my kids birthday and my birthday, Christmas and New years enjoying Holiday food. I spent New Years eve in isolation. (blow the party puffers here) But after quite a depressing holiday season it appeared we got it! I was doing perfectly well other than my occasional spouts of exhaustion. Because of my thyroid being removed I have to be on medication for life. I cannot miss a doctors appointment and not get a refill. If off of the medication for too long I would die. Your thyroid helps control so much of your body, from heart rate to metabolism without it your body slows down until it stops completely. But I am grateful to be alive. A few weeks ago I went to see my endocrinologist and it seems like it is back yet again. I did a few biopsies, all benign. So I am on another Low Iodine Diet. This time I only missed Halloween treats so I will survive :) Unfortunately we are in the same spot we were in before. We have a feeling it is back but don't know where. I am doing a body scan on Friday. Today, Tomorrow, Wednesday and Friday I have doctors appointments I must attend. Hopefully we can find it, if not I will most likely be doing a CT scan on my lungs to check there. It is like a needle in a haystack, isn't it? lol The only reason I tell this incredibly long and boring story is to encourage you all to check your necks. Go to the doctor. Get checked out. Don't let it get out of control. DAMN the cost, your life is more important. Go. Check. What are you waiting for?
