Rough week for parts of my head

Lots of stuff going on, but this week in particular has been really bad for my head.

Monday, I went to my dentist because of considerable pain in my upper right jaw the week before, and I had noticed last weekend that the tooth that was causing all the pain was loose. First my dentist says, "Ok, I need to replace the crown on that tooth as well as the one next to it." The right side of my mouth is numbed. About 15 minutes later the drilling starts. Next thing I know, he is telling me, "I am sorry, Florida, one of the roots of that tooth is broken....I will have to extract it." Ugh. Then he says, "I need to put a bridge in." Huh?!? The only thing I could say in reply was, "I don't think I've had one of those before, what does that mean?" "No, you have not. Let me show you...." So I have a lovely temporary bridge in there now, and an appt in two weeks to have the bridge set. And why is this all happening? Because my teeth are shifting. Why are my teeth shifting? Because I still grind, but probably more so whenever I take a nap and I don't have my night guard in. Crud.

Thursday, I had an appt with the eye doc I saw earlier this month about my teary left eye. All the doc said at that appt was "I need to go in and find out where the blockages are in both of your eyes." I'm thinking to myself, "Sure, that's what the guy I was referred to last January did, so this should be a breeze." But when I left his PA gave me a sheet of paper titled "Eye Surgery". So, I was a bit confused what was going to happen because the only other thing he said was "Yes, you can drive yourself home, although there might be a little discomfort after the procedure." Hmph. So Thursday, they called me back 45 minutes after my appt time - he was doing the same procedure on someone else right before me. Anyway, I am sitting there in this bigger than usual exam chair, and the PA hands me the consent form for a '4 lid punctoplasty'. Didn't even know this thing had a name, but now this is starting to sound serious. She leans the chair back and starts to explain that my eyes will be closed the whole time, she'll swab on an anesthetic, then he'll inject more and start the procedure. Before he starts, my eye doc tells me I might have bruising at the areas where he injected the anesthetic - Yes, I do have that today, and now the green goo coming out of my left eye today is starting to cloud my vision.

The results were, my cannicula on the left side are clear, however my left tear duct is completely blocked. The right side is completely clear, but if there were any kind of blockage, he just cleared it out for me. Super. The recommendation, of course, is to have a DCR done, same procedure the eye doc last year recommended. But this eye doc at least explained it a little less violently: "I will drill a hole in the bone on the left side of your nose close to the inner corner of your left eye...a passage way will be made so your tears will be re-routed...a tube will be left in there for three months...a string will keep the opening open at the top...I will use stitches that dissolve to cover the area where the incision in your nose bone is made." Ok, not happy he also breaks the bone and doesn't go through the nose. So I ask if there are any problems with this tube that will be stuck in my nose for three months. "No, it will not be visible (in my nostril?), but it needs to stay there so the new opening will not heal itself closed." "Will I be able to feel it?, like will it be itchy?" "No, most people can feel it for the first week, but not so much after that. I did have one case where it made the patient sneeze all the time, so it had to be removed a few weeks earlier." Interesting. "Am I going to look like I was punched in my left eye for two weeks?" "No, most people look fine the following week when they come back for their post-op appt., and the procedure is done on a Thursday, so you have the whole weekend to relax, and you could work from home the next day." The surgery takes 40 minutes!, and is done as an outpatient procedure. I will need someone to drive me home afterward, and I should not do anything too strenuous the rest of that day. I will be able to wear my glasses and contacts - the pads from my eyeglasses won't hit that area (not sure if he is accounting for the Asian nose or not), and the string in the inner corner of my eye will not be bothered by my contact lenses. "You can think about it and let us know." Are you kidding me? "No need to, I'll take your first open date, I want this thing fixed already. I am so tired of having to blot my left, teary, eye." So my appt is on May 10. Oddly enough, that date is the week between my two thyroid surgery two years ago.

Now we start the weekend before my mom's lung surgery. The mass on her left lung is almost 100% cancer based on the CT and PET scans. Luckily, the two lymph nodes involved can be removed with the upper left lobe. My mom seems to be at peace with all of this. She too understands that things happen for a reason, something I had to accept myself when I found out that my FNA had what looked like hurthle cells. I was hoping I would never have to accept a member of my own family into my 'cancer club', but I am no longer alone in this club of certain unpleasantness. I at least know what she is going through - the feelings, the anxiety, all the 'what ifs' that go through your mind every single day because I have been there. So the rough week for parts of my head is to be followed by a rough week for my heart as I have to see my mom begin her own cancer journey on Monday morning.

Thyroid plays a part in episode of 'New Girl' 3/6/12

I like watching the Fox tv series 'New Girl', so I was pleasantly surprised to see the episode that aired this evening covers a thyroid issue of one of the characters. Funny thing is he is at an OB doc who points out the lump on his neck, and a lot of ThyCans are at their Gyn doc when their nodule is discovered.

Here is a review of the episode:
http://m.tvfanatic.com/2012/03/new-girl-review-skinny-dipping-and-nick-millers-sad-song/

Catching up with my meds

I ran out of Levoxyl Monday morning. When I tried to refill my prescription late Monday night, I was told my prescription expired, so I couldn't get a refill since I needed a new prescription.

Luckily, I can go without taking my daily Levoxyl dose, so long as I take the missed doses sometime during the week. I was not able to pick up my new prescription until last night, so this morning I need to take the three missed doses, plus my regular morning doses (Levoxyl + T3) for this morning. Bottoms up!...

Poke my left eye some more, please...

Today, was my appointment with the eye doc my Endo referred me to. He seemed pretty nice. Said that there is a breast cancer drug that is notorious for blocking tear ducts, so my eye wasn't the first he had seen that was blocked up as a result of cancer treatment. He also seemed to know the eye surgeon I saw last January.

He did a test to make sure my eyes were making enough tears, that they were not in fact dry. He put these strips of paper close to the outer corners of my eyes. Didn't feel too bad. The right side felt like it was making more tears than the left side. I passed the tear making test.

Next he looked at my tear ducts, and under my lids, etc. He said there is a hole that leads into the punctum, that pocket looking thing at the inner corner of your eye, but he needs to find out where exactly the blockage is. So I get to go back in two weeks and have "eye surgery" done. Well, at least that is what it said on the sheet I was given, to prepare for the procedure.

He will numb my eyes (well, he didn't really poke around too much with my right eye, so not sure if it will be poked like the left side), then will send in a scope to see how far he can go down the tear duct, or if the tear duct is closed and he can make a loop through the canulas (sp?). Sounds exciting, right? Hopefully he does a much better job of numbing my eyes than the eye doc from last year.

So, depending on what he finds, that will dictate my treatment. Fix my eye, please!

Medical bills...bills..bills...

Finally, almost all of my medical bills from last year have been corrected. The big issue wasn't with any of my ThyCa related doctor visits, but more with all the PT visits I had. I had a total of 30 visits, 10 over the 20 allowable. Will be glad when all my PT invoices are adjusted for my health care provider.

Next week I see the eye specialist for my leaky left eye. Wonder what kind of surgery will be needed to fix it. My boss's husband had a procedure done last December for a similar issue. Either I get this fixed or buy stock in Kleenex.

And here comes some more cancer

Thankfully, not my own. Sadly, someone else in my family is joining the club. My mom's lung mass is still there. She awaits a PET scan to check for lymph node involvement and to confirm it has not spread outside the structure of the lung. My brother says that since surgery is an option, it is probably still in the early stages.

She seems to be taking it well, so far. She only told her prayer group, but has decided that she didn't want to tell anyone else outside of our immediate family about it until after she has the PET scan and sees her pulmonary doc again. I seem to be taking it pretty well so far, also. I almost broke down in the bathroom at CostCo, but then I thought to myself, "my mom isn't dead. she has lung cancer, but her doc seems pretty confident that it can be removed with surgery. sure it sucks that she has to have surgery. it sucks even more that she has cancer. but she isn't dead. she can still live a long life after this. i don't have a reason to cry." I'm here for my mom. To help her through this journey. To keep her in good spirits. To let her know it is Ok to cry whenever she wants to. She is going to make it through this.

Non-small cell lung cancer. This is the type of lung cancer that non-smokers get. Non-smoking Asian women have a higher incidence of getting this type of lung cancer because of their exposure to second hand smoke. Unfortunately, my grand-father was a smoker.

ThyCa group meeting - February 7, 2012

It has been several months since the last post I did on my local support group meetings. We have had a few speakers (endocrinologist, surgeon) already. This evening we had a pharmacology student speak to us about our meds. It was interesting and of course informative. We had a lot of questions, so his 20 minute presentation was stretched out to 90 mins!

When he was describing the mental effects of being hypothyroid, and he said "mental dullness", which was not on his slide/handout. I had to stop him to make sure I heard him correctly. Gave me a good chuckle because I had never heard of thyroid brain fog described this way. "Mental dullness". Nice.

One of his slides had a table with the different medications. "Liotrix", sold under the brand name 'Thyrolar' was listed by itself. I have never heard of either. Liotrix, he explained, is the synthetic form of desiccated thyroid, or 'Armour Thyroid', which is pretty much pig thyroid. Since it comes from an animal's thyroid, and has both T3 and T4 in it. Armour is marketed as 'natural' thyroid medication because it comes from a pig, not chemicals. For some, Armour works wonders. The controversy is in the fact that it is hard to regulate exactly how much of T3 v T4 is in each Armour pill. What I found interesting is that he said it actually does have chemicals in it, which is necessary to bind it together into a pill form. So it is 'natural' thyroid plus some chemicals to keep it stable. Got it. Anyway, Liotrix is a drug that has both T3 and T4 in it (1:4 ratio). It is not a very common drug prescribed because our bodies automatically convert T4 into T3. Most don't need the extra T3. Others, like myself, need additional T3 to clear up issues, like afternoon fatigue, or thyroid brain fog.

Among the food interactions to avoid right before or after taking our daily T4 dose, he listed 'cottonseed meal'. I asked what that was, and he didn't know. So I Googled it: animal feed. Doubt I will ever eat animal feed for breakfast, so I don't see this as a problem.

We have another speaker at our meeting next month - a radiologist who will go over the finer points of the radio-iodine ablation treatment. We are also hoping to get a pathologist. Mary, one of the other co-facilitators, has done a fantastic job coordinating all of the speakers for our meetings. Me on the other hand, nothing. It is getting to the point where I send out the meeting reminders the Friday before the meetings, so I feel like a bit of a slacker. I guess the most important thing is that we all show up for the meetings.