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December 22, 2006
Merry Christmas! You (might) Have Cancer!
Good thing I'm Jewish. Otherwise, my holiday season would really suck.
This post, by the way, is an anomaly. I don't plan to document my medical travails in the public eye. (Trust me, I've been through a lot since I started blogging and never bothered to blab about it here.) No one's even sure I have cancer. But it's highly probable that I have thyroid cancer. Just the news you want to hear a few weeks after starting a new job.
So here's the deal - last summer in Chicago, I was complaining about problems in my leg (numbness, sensations of heat, difficulty walking). My doc ordered a few MRI's to rule out MS. Those showed an enlarged thyroid, which sent me to an endocrinologist. She ordered a fine needle aspiration (FNA, aka biopsy). Never really got the results. A month later I called from LA and got some gobbleygook. My doc here sent me to an endocrinologist who decided to do another FNA - this time of both nodules. The nodule that wasn't checked in Chicago is highly probably for papillary carcinoma, the most common (and least metastasizing type) of thyroid cancer.
The upside is that 95% of people live 10 years following a diagnosis of papillary carcinoma. The downside, I might lose my singing voice. Oh, and I'll be on medication for the rest of my life and a bunch of other crap. That's if the second opinion agrees that I need to have my thyroid removed.
Merry Xmas.
It's times like this that I wish I had spent more time cultivating a social circle and less time on political activism...
Posted by cj at December 22, 2006 06:49 PM
Comments
Hang in there, CJ. Hang in, hang on, hang on. You've got a ton of sisters (and brothers who are honorary sisters) out here - your political activism has grown you a circle. I'm here, Cameron's here. Call us if you want to get together before Monday. Seriously. Do it. Call. Don't be tough, don't be strong. There's no need. We're here.
Posted by: Jeanmarie at December 22, 2006 07:30 PM
Biopsy specimens are often taken from part of a lesion when the cause of a disease is uncertain or its extent or exact character is in doubt. WBR LeoP
Posted by: Meds Man at January 21, 2007 02:42 PM