"It could go either way," my doctor said as he was giving me back my biopsy results on a Friday evening at 6:32 p.m. "We won't really know until we take it out surgically and do a frozen section for pathology at the time of surgery." That was ten days before I went under the knife.
I didn't need no stinkin' frozen section. I knew during that phone call, I HAVE CANCER. I kind of knew before, but it was after that phone call, cancer grabbed me by the neck (HA, I can say literally and roll my eyes here) and shook me the fuck up. It was the first and only time I fell to pieces with my sidekick cancer. Yes, it was all the scary pieces, the I'm gonna die pieces, the what if it spreads pieces. I realized at that moment , I'd been faking it every other time I'd cried. I used to say "oh, I cried hysterically about so and so". Well, let me tell you, cancer showed me what crying hysterically is all about. It's about not being able to catch your breath when you desperately want air, it's about tears jumping off your face
horizontally , it's about an insane heat that rises up in your neck to your face to the point you seriously feel your head is about to pop off, and it's about the deepest sadness you could ever imagine.
Curtis noticed it sometime in the middle of August. It started off sweetly enough, him cupping my face and looking deeply into my eyes (don't envy me a romantic husband, this is standard Curtis protocol when he wants me to do something I normally hate, like pick up the poop in the backyard), then, seemingly out of nowhere, he lifted my chin up and felt the middle of my neck with a quizzical look on his face as his head was turned sideways.
"It's nothing", I said as I abruptly blew him off and had a quick feel for myself. "It's just my Adam's apple."
Do women even have an Adam's apple?
I thought it was weight gain and my neck was showing a couple of extra ounces. I didn't want my husband to notice for the first time that I may have a thick neck.
Within the next week, my adam's apple had grown into a very alarming goiter-like presence on my neck. I couldn't wait to get to Urgent Care where the doctor immediately referred me to a surgeon.
When your first referral out of Urgent care is a surgeon, brace yourself for the worst.
And let me just say, I did not have a goiter. I have no idea why it matters to me to clear this up, but it does. A goiter is when the thyroid itself is enlarged. My thyroid was just the right size, thank you. My problem was I had a tumor on top of my thyroid, that kind of looked like a goiter. Totally different. The stupid thing is, that having a goiter, medically speaking, is so much better than having a tumor. Why, in the hell, I'm proud to say I did not have a goiter is beyond me.
Days following Urgent care was an ultrasound and a consult with my surgeon who performed an FNA (fine needle aspiration) biopsy.
I was hoping to find comfort in the ultrasound tech, as surely she sees this stuff all the time. Granted, she's used to seeing cute little babies that look like sea horses, but still, she's an ultrasound tech for god's sake. They utlra sound check everything these days. I wanted to punch her as she gasped for air and asked like a little snot, "gawd, what is
that ?"
"Probably a goiter." was the only thing I could think to reply.
The biopsy went slightly better, other than the fact that I absolutely hate needles and wasn't expecting a fine needle biopsy on that particular day. It was only suppose to be a consult. Who goes into a consult and gets an obnoxiously thick needle stuck in their throat?
I heard a gurgling sound, then the doc said, "I need another needle, please." At this point, I forgot there was a nurse in the room so my mind was racing to figure out how to get him another needle while (1) my eyes were closed and (2) I had no idea what the freaking needle looked like because I'd had my eyes closed the entire time.
He went on to explain that he hadn't expected a fluid filled cyst and that was actually a good thing because it would make the mass on my neck decrease in size as he expelled all the fluid from it. In actuality, that's a very bad thing as more than one tumor or mass or nodule increases the risk for cancer.
In the end, the tumor was a little bigger than the size of a golf ball. It had wrapped itself around a muscle in my neck, that I no longer have, but not to worry, there are five other muscles that are coping just fine.
I had surgery last Monday, September 22. My surgeon and I had an agreement: no cancer, he only gets the right side of my thyroid. Cancer, he gets the whole thing.
Dammit if I'm not sitting here typing without a thyroid.
The pre-op surgical nurse told me the surgeon booked the operating room for 90 minutes.
"I should be between an hour or two." I rightly told my husband.
MY SURGERY TOOK FOUR AND A HALF HOURS.
I say this with all the sarcasm and humor void, the worst part about this whole thing, the saddest part, the part I would do over again if I could and make it right, is the two and a half hours part where my husband had to pace in the waiting room not knowing what was going on in the operating room. That hurts me more than any incision, any scar, any needle, any cancer ever could.
My surgery started a little before 4pm and after 5pm, the customer service for the surgery department at the hospital went home. They are usually the ones that keep loved ones in the waiting room updated with information. Unfortunately, I had a late surgery.
I remember waking up from surgery feeling so sick from the anaesthesia. I threw up twice, which is a huge deal when you just had your throat operated on. The first thing I remember hearing was the post-op nurse telling the nurse that would be assigned to my room that night is "TOTAL THYROIDECTOMY."
The thing about being doped up is that you can register thoughts, like I knew that meant I definitely, without a doubt had cancer, but your emotions and your sense of doom and dread, get checked at the door. My body was incapable of giving me a shred of energy to go into hysterics.
But then again, I'd been there and done that. The Friday afternoon phone call, remember?
When I got to my room, I was so weak, mostly from not eating or drinking anything since midnight the night before, that all I could think about was JELLO.
When the nurses gave me instructions and asked me a slew of questions as they were getting me and my IV situated in bed, my only response to them was a whisper of "JELLO."
Can you raise your arm so I can take your blood pressure?
JELLO
I'm going to give you an antibiotic drug for your drip.
JELLO
Do you need any pain medication?
JELLO
I finally, after proving I could a handle a cup of ice chips, got my JELLO.
Two hospital dispensed orange cups of JELLO.
That JELLO tasted like crusty Italian bread, a couple of slices of really good prosciutto, some brine-cured black olives and a perfectly ripe pear all at once.
My sweet husband, who was just thankful I was alive, was spooning this deliousness into my mouth, albeit not fast enough and missing my mouth for my chin more times than I would have preferred. What would I do without him?
It took me until the next morning to get my voice back. The most I needed for pain was a pair of tylenol. And I walked out of the hospital at 2 o'clock the next afternoon with my head held high.
I will live to survive this. I will not die from thyroid cancer.
I've read over and over again: If you had to pick a cancer, thyroid cancer is the one to pick.
I'm not sure whether to be relieved or offended by this statement.
First of all, people don't
pick their cancers. I certainly didn't pick mine. Don't get me wrong, I'm grateful and consider myself fortunate that I got one that has over a 90% survival rate.
Secondly, that statement does little to comfort someone in the later stages of ovarian cancer who also didn't have the luxury of picking her cancer.
And lastly, people do die from thyroid cancer.
I know it's meant only to emphasize the survival rate, but I doubt I will be using that term to describe my cancer any time soon.
I still have a date with radioactive iodine in my near future. Also, a body scan to make sure all of the cancer is gone.
I will forever be under the care of an endocrinologist and will take a thyroid supplement for the rest of my life.
I am stronger today than I have ever been in my entire life.
And I am also more grateful and alive than I thought possible.
Things
do smell sweeter when your eyes are open. It's not just a saying.
