Thyroid Fever (Part 1)

“Death is what gives life meaning. To know your days are numbered and your time is short.“
- Doctor Strange (2016)

Now it can be told (better yet, written).

My post-biopsy procedure selfie

Last October 12, I had my regular annual physical check-up. For me, since I undergo APE every year, it was a routinary activity, just like in the past years.  Imagine my surprise when during the physical exam, our company doctor asked me to swallow a lot of times as she palpated my neck. She said she would see a movement in the left side of my neck each time I swallow. I wasn’t really paying attention because I wasn’t feeling anything, and I wasn’t alarmed – yet. She wanted me to have a neck and thyroid ultrasound and she also asked if she didn’t advise me about it the previous year. I said no, because otherwise I would remember it, and I would have heeded her advice.

So after getting my LOA from our HR (thank you, Fred for all the assistance), I spent the day
going to Asian Hospital to have that ultrasound and sadly yes, I took a VL (which I rarely do), missed our event at the office, and instead of resting and spending it with my son who just turned 11, it was spent somewhere else.

While the radiology staff was doing the procedure, she asked me, “Ma’am, wala kayong nakakapa?” I said, none. Two things were going inside my head at that time. Why did she ask that? One, she wasn’t seeing anything and it might help if I would tell her kung meron nga ako nakakapa, and kung saan, para dun sya magfocus. Or two, she’s indeed seeing something but was wondering why I wasn’t. Dear Lord, that was when I started to freak out. I couldn’t understand what was being shown on the screen, and what she was measuring. What if I indeed have a mass on my neck? What will happen and what does it mean? I felt so alone then, and scared out of my wits.

After an hour and a half, I went back to the radiology center to get the results. I sat down and braced myself. Reading the report, heavens fell as soon as I saw this:

Cystic, complex and solid thyroid masses. Complex mass in the left lower pole is worrisome for malignancy. Biopsy is suggested.

I felt more alone than ever. I started to text and send viber messages to my husband, siblings, and close friends. I was crying in the waiting lounge and I just wanted to stay there until God knows when.

I went back to the office to show the report to our company doctor. She consulted our Medical Director, who advised me to see a neck surgeon in Makati Med. She said surgery was the better option than biopsy. (To) surgically remove the masses because they might not be able to get sufficient smears for the latter. “Tanggalin na, yun na ang ipa-biopsy. Para isang procedure na lang if they turn out to be malignant.”

I felt it was too drastic as an option, surgery agad? Wala bang iba muna? I asked for other options and they asked me to see an endocrinologist. Which I said I would.

I didn’t realize it was difficult to see one at need. Each endo seems to be “by appointment only”. Available slots were already in November at that time, and I felt they were already too late. Parang ang dami nang pwedeng mangyari between then and the available dates, at wala pa kong kamalay-malay sa totoong condition ko.

Ms. Joh, a colleague, referred me to her co-parent who is an endo at Asian. I said I would check her out and call her clinic for appointment. In the meantime, I was looking for other doctors in a hospital near us. I found one who accommodates patients on a “first come, first served” basis, and has a Saturday clinic. When we came to see her, it was only then when we realized that doctors under the “Department of Endocrinology” were not necessarily endocrinologists. She was a diabetologist. But she checked my sonogram results and asked me to have additional blood tests – FT3, FT4, and TSH (thyroid function tests). She referred me to an endo also from the same hospital and she said those tests were the same ones he will ask me to have.

I was thinking if the blood tests were covered under our hospitalization insurance. But my husband decided that regardless if they were covered or not, the waiting period was too long, we might as well proceed that Saturday. Results were to be available after two days, the lab staff said the earliest was Monday. We managed somehow to suspend fears and other possible related emotions, and made it through that weekend. I wasn't telling my kids yet about it because I did not have anything concrete to tell them anyway. In the meantime, I tried to follow the diabetologist’s advice to avoid food giving me bad cholesterol, like fried stuff (eggs once a week only), and soya (there goes my weekly taho supply), dairy (milk, cheese), gata and the like. I tried to take it easy on myself, waking up later than the usual, and rest whenever I felt like it. My husband also brought up alternative medicine, which was recommended by a former officemate of his. We'll see, I said.

To the uninitiated like us, like me, the word “malignancy” is enough to kill you. If the cyst or mass or nodules are not malignant, the fear caused by it itself is enough to knock you dead. Believe me. The thought that something inside you is a killer would kill you. The thought that your days might be numbered. The thought that you might die. My God, I was praying. My children need me. Don’t let me die just yet. You may find this dramatic, but it’s true.  In the movie Doctor Strange, the Ancient One said, “No one is ever ready. We don't get to choose our time.”

“Death is what gives life meaning. To know your days are numbered and your time is short.“

To be reminded of your mortality, and that life is too short, time is not enough for the things you want to do and achieve, to be with the people you love.

Why thyroid? I was asking myself. All my life, I thought I was ok. I just had a most wonderful 45th birthday. How can I be sick? What a cruel joke. If there’s one thing that we dealt with, it’s myoma for my sisters, and hormonal imbalance. And kidney problems. Bladder stones. My daughter has scoliosis, Caehl has strabismus or lazy eye. But wait, my mom had goiter when she was younger. Eto pa yata ang magiging problema ko, I feared.

Alex came home with the thyroid function test results Monday evening, and reading them, I was again wondering, my FT3, FT4 and TSH were within normal range. So what was wrong with me then? By Wednesday, we went to the endocrinologist. I don’t have hyperthyroidism or hypothyroidism. Seeing the ultrasound results and again, after palpating my neck, the verdict was: surgery. And it wasn’t just to remove the masses on the left, but also the ones on the right, and…tada! Thyroidectomy or removal of my entire thyroid glands.

To be continued...
http://therealgoodgirl.blogspot.com/2016/11/thyroid-fever-part-2.html