Recovery

Two surgeries down, hopefully no more to go! I came though my surgery yesterday much better than I did with last weeks surgery. I am not sure why I fared better this round – perhaps because I already knew what to expect or perhaps my anesthesiologist mixed a better cocktail for me. Last week I became very ill from the pain medication and that was just plain miserable. This time around they knew to give me anti-nausea medication prior to anything else. It made quite a difference.  I was also quite at ease going into the surgery – all smiles, though I am sure my mom and husband could read the slight bit of anxiety in my eyes. Last week there was the huge unknown of whether or not it was cancer and how the recovery process would be. I am the type of person that cannot stand the unknown – it eats away at me. But now that we know it is cancer and we are on a treatment plan, I feel more in control of the situation. It is comforting to feel in control of something when you are dealing with such an uncontrollable force as cancer.

The surgeon removed the left side of my thyroid so I am now without any thyroid gland. He also took a few lymph nodes from the right side of my neck where the cancer was removed last week. From the sounds of it, the lymph nodes looked pretty good but were removed as a precautionary measure. They were sent to pathology for biopsy to see if the cancer has reached the lymph nodes and we should have the results soon.   Taking them out now also decreases the chances of  a third surgery. The calcium levels in my blood after surgery were in normal range so that was my ticket to freedom from the hospital! It is much easier to recover at home than in the hospital since it is impossible to sleep there. The nurses are in and out all through the night checking vitals, changing IVs, taking blood, and giving pain medication. I came right home and slept the afternoon away. Thank goodness for pain pills!

Where do we go from here? I will be seeing an endocrinologist next week to continue my treatment plan. Of course I need to be on thyroid medication for the rest of my life given that I am now without one. I am told that will be the tricky part of all of this – find the right medications at the right doses to properly regulate my body. It is amazing how much the thyroid gland regulates in your body and the effects it can have if not properly regulated.  I have been warned of the side effects – fatigue, weight gain (more weight gain…), depression, so on and so forth – until my medications have been sorted out. 

I will also being having a body scan to see if the cancer has spread and if there is any thyroid tissue left. The surgeon has told me that while they do remove both lobes of the thyroid it is impossible to get it all out. Thyroid cancer is not treated by an oncologist with radiation or chemotherapy. It is treated by the endocrinologist with radio-iodine treatments which kills any remaining cancer. I will be given the radio-iodine and then have to be isolated from other people for 5 or so days. I am not quite sure if it will be out patient or inpatient. I do not know how it works when you have children. It seems almost impossible to be in the home environment but yet keep your children six feet away at all times. I am sure these details will all be sorted out soon enough. Anyhow, I will go through the scan and radio-iodine treatment as many times as needed until I have a clean scan. Once I have a clean scan it becomes an annual event to have a scan to makes sure the cancer has not returned. 

I was flipping through my magazine last night at the hospital and came across an ad for thyroid cancer and the “check the neck” campaign. I did not realize that thyroid cancer is one of the fastest growing cancers in the nation. My cancer was found by a fluke. I started having problems swallowing in January 2008 but attributed it to allergies from moving from Seattle to Scottsdale. I finally made an appointment and saw an ear, nose and throat doctor during the summer and had a barium swallow test done which showed I had reflux. He told me my difficultly swallowing was caused by lesions in my throat from the ongoing reflux. They would heal after I took the reflux medication for a bit. Fast forward to November and I went to have a routine physical with my general physician. I mentioned to him that I was still having difficulty swallowing so he doubled my reflux medication. He also took routine blood work. That routine blood work came back with my thyroid levels elevated so he ordered an ultrasound of my thyroid and more inclusive blood work. The ultrasound found the mass which then led to the uptake scan, the biopsy and finally surgery. However, the more inclusive blood work that was done showed that my thyroid levels were fine.  So it was that one day – November 14th – that my thyroid levels just happened to be off that set this into motion. Because in all reality, in absence of the cancer. my thyroid was functioning normal.

There is still some debate over whether or not the mass is the true problem with my swallowing. The surgeon does not feel it is what is causing it but all the other doctors I have seen think otherwise. I guess we will have to wait and see once the swelling goes down whether or not I can swallow! My point in all this is that my mass could not be felt from my neck, it was set back too far. But the majority of thyroid nodules can be seen or felt with a neck examine so I will jump on the “check the neck” campaign and urge everyone to do just that. Statistically, less than 1% of thyroid nodules/masses actually turn out to be cancer. But after being a part of that 1%, I hope it reminds people that this cancer, though fairly rare, does exist. Okay, I am jumping off my soap box and back into bed to rest!

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~ by kawilliams1 on February 11, 2009.