So I originally created this blog about 2 1/2 years ago for totally different reasons. As I said in my previous post, I like to talk and write but I honestly forgot about creating this all together. Of course with so many current changes and challenges going on in my life, I feel the need to vent and talk about it. So here I go…. 🙂
I think we have all experienced a time in our lives where we go to the doctor for concerns and by the time we leave, we feel stupid for ever coming in the first place. And that is because we just wasted three hours there: 2 hours in the waiting room, 45 minutes in the actual room waiting for the doctor to show up then only to spend 15 minutes, if we are lucky, talking to the doctor. I think it goes without saying that it ends up being a waste of time and we don’t want to go back, ever! Well I have been lucky enough to have dealt with this SEVERAL times the Summer of 2014 – I know, don’t be jealous!
So to give you a little bit of a back story, I just started going back to the doctor to get physicals about 3 years ago. I had just turned 25 and have 2 kiddos so it was time to make sure I was healthy. Each time that I’ve gone, they’ve told me 3 things: for the most part you are really healthy, you aren’t drinking enough water (go figure) and your Thyroid numbers are slightly off so lets bring you back in for re-tests. This was told to me for the years 2012 through 2014. Each time when I came back weeks later to do the retest, everything is normal again. My doctor would say “Not to worry because it happens all the time.” Well after this last time, I brought up some of my concerns with my weight again and how I was never able lose any and I’ve gained about 45 pounds in approximately 4 years. I understand that this happens to people, especially women after giving birth and as we get old (yadda yadda, blah blah), but I’ve always had a great metabolism and stayed in “decent” shape. My doctor continued to shrug me off and told me maybe I needed to consult with the nutritionist to ensure I was on the right “diet.” I was pretty upset about this because, don’t get me wrong, I probably could have done a better job with my diet but either way, I was trying and exercising on top of it – there should have given me better results. After the retest this time, it came back slightly different (showing Hypothyroidism) so they did some additional tests to check my pituitary gland as well because my T3 and T4 levels were conflicting with my TSH levels. Once again, everything came back normal on that end as well. So my doctor at that point just wanted to refer me to an Endocrinologist. He said either way, its probably not an issue because my levels are not enough to do anything about it but this way they can keep an eye on it as he was sure it was going to get worse with time and age.
That was another 2 month wait – I live in a really small town outside of the D.C. Metro area and there is only Endocrinologist within an hour of me. FINALLY at the end of September I was able to see her and they took another look at my blood work. She didn’t seem concerned just said that I could be going through hormone changes (from a recent miscarriage) as well as many other things. Once again, I only went over the last 5 or 6 times I had blood work done with her and she basically gave me an “excuse” for each one. She wrote me a order to come back in 6 months to do more blood work and we’d “go from there” before trying to walk me out of the office….really?!?!
Finally she decided to feel my neck ONE time before leaving and there it was, that was the lump that changed my life. She immediately wrote me a referral to the local hospital to have an ultrasound done. She let me know that there is only a 1% chance that it’s cancerous…wow just like that, she threw out the “C” word. I held it together just long enough to get home to my Hubby and cry…..
(I’ll continue the beginning of my story the next time….)
Because Its Not The Good Cancer 