hel_ana | stop the thyroid fun train, i want to get off!

NB: Mike, this is going to look familiar, since you're the only one who I've written it out to.. cut and paste is a good thing. ;)

To the rest of you, this may be a bit clinical, veering at times into humour. If you don't want to read about it, I'll completely understand. Let me know and I'll remove you from the thyroid filter.

I got my biopsy results last night.

To be explicitly up-front, I'm not going to die. So you can't have my fabric stash, Arnora. My surgeon pointed out that patients in my situation generally outlive their doctors (I asked him how that made him feel, and he said "kinda sad, actually" LOL)

Basically, there's no conclusive diagnosis from the Fine Needle Aspiration Biopsy - they can only tell whether or not it's likely that further investigation is needed. There are 8 markers that they look for, and my cells showed four of them, which combined with the size, and other clinical factors, means that I have a 75-80% chance of having papillary carcinoma of the thyroid. As a result, surgery is indicated, to remove at least half of the thyroid (the one with the lump in it). I'll give you all the address to send the flowers to when I have a date for the surgery. I prefer yellow roses.

If you read anything on the internet about thyroid cancer, you'll run across references to it being a "good cancer". You may also see "if you have to have cancer, this is the one you want".. This is because most thyroid cancers are very slow to progress, and they tend not to spread too much. As well, there's a "magic bullet" - radioactive iodine treatment, that will generally serve to kill off all thyroid tissue in the subject, or anyone around the subject in the first few days.

(As a sidenote... if I ask you to come visit me the day I have RAI, you can probably assume you've done something to piss me off.)

In my case, the planned treatment is to remove the entire thyroid, because I have antibodies attacking my thyroid that will render it non-functional sooner or later. Either way, I'll have to take supplementation for the rest of my life. So it's a choice between, in ten years, having a non-functioning piece of glandular tissue in my neck and taking T4 forever, or having no glandular tissue in my neck and taking T4 forever.

Followup treatment is the aformentioned RAI, to kill off all thyroid cells in my body. (And I'm angling for a GlowWorm to keep me company, since I'll have to be in isolation for that part.)

So my surgeon's receptionist is on the phone today trying to get some OR time, and setting up things with the radioactive iodine guy in London.

I'm feeling ok, because all the uncertainty is gone... I know what's going on, we have a treatment plan, and I trust my doctor. (For one, his mother nursed with my mother for 20 years, and my mother says he's the best surgeon in the area. For another, I'll be in a hospital where my mother's worked for >30 years, so I'll get really good care, mostly cause they're scared of her.)

If you have any questions, please feel free to ask. I'm considering starting up a private LJ (I_am_hels_thyroid) to deal with this stuff, but that's mostly cause then I could make a post-modern reference to old reader's digests.

I just want to state one thing: my mindset going into this is that if I can't laugh at this, then I might as well go home, get under the covers, and just huddle. I do need everyone's support in that, though.

Thanks very much to all of you for your good thoughts yesterday in Ross' journal.. I appreciated every one of them.

Love and hugs to all.