Monday, June 11, 2012

Blog June Post 12 - Back to It


There is something that makes it a bit harder to go back to work after a long weekend. I think sometimes long weekends cause you to have two Monday's - even though you don't go to work for one of them. Today is cold and rainy again so I wish I was still in bed.

By now you would figure that I hate the cold. I have always hated it for as long as I remember. I think the only time I like the cold is when there is a wood burner/open fire going in the house and it is cosy. But most times you still have to get cold to do something. That's why I hate it - you always have to get cold. You can by cosy inside but eventually you have to go outside and get cold (even when rugged up). Or you can have a nice warm shower - but you have to get cold to get out and dressed. Or you can be nice and warm rugged up in bed - but you have to get cold when you get up.

I have bad circulation so I am susceptible to cold hands and feet. My feet can be rugged up in bed socks and slippers and still be cold. I think some of it may be due to my thyroid condition.

I have been thinking about my thyroid condition a lot after discovering this blog during #blogjune. This one bought back a lot of memories for me.

Back in 2000, not long after I had moved back to Brisbane from Emerald, I discovered a lump on my neck. It was like an Adam’s apple but to the side - and since I am female - it was all wrong. I went to the doctors to get it investigated and this started some tests.

I had been having thyroid tests for a few years leading up to this because I was a avid exerciser - I mean teaching up to 10 aerobic classes a week, cycling, doing gym work, walking/running, swimming etc and I seemed never to lose weight and always be lethargic. Ok the tiredness was not what you would normally suffer from doing all that exercise - it was more an "I don't want to get out of bed" tiredness that happened everyday.

All the thyroid tests came back "normal." So then the lump appeared. After a few tests including a fine needles aspiration - which I hope to never ever have to go through again - they worked out there were nodules growing on the right thyroid gland. The tests showed that they weren't malignant but because they were growing and would eventually impact on my breathing, the right thyroid would have to come out.

Closer to the operation, they did some blood tests and also worked out that my body was attacking my thyroid so it wasn't working properly. I often wonder if this had been going on for years and it just didn't really show itself until the lump appeared.

I won't go into detail of the removal other than to say I was really really afraid of dying - I had never been under before and because the operation was on my neck, I was sure they would cut a major blood vessel and I would bleed to death. Some said at least if I'm asleep I wouldn't know it happened.

Now apart from a faint scar and the fact I take thyroxine every day - life is back to normal. But is it!! While all my blood test show I am now in the normal range - I can't help feeling that I'm not back to normal. I exercise all the time - it doesn't make that much difference to my weight - I still feel lethargic and I still get really cold. All of these are symptoms of hypothyroidism.

I constantly wish that someone had given me a thyroid test at a time in my life when I had my ultimate energy levels and then I would know if I was "normal." Instead they base these tests on a range. I have argued this with doctors many a time and they always say it could be my lifestyle change (ie you have a child and you will be tired), or stress, or not getting enough sleep or hormones - basically they have an answer for everything and if the test says you are in the normal range then you are in the normal range and have nothing to be concerned about.

So I go on with life and hope that one day my body decides to adjust back to that ultimate range that I once had a long time ago.

There are some funny moments I can recall during this tough period of my life - that being the operation and recovery etc - one being the fact that I had staples along my neck. I told my nephew who was young at the time (he's 18 now), that if he watched me have a glass of water, the water would run out of the staples like a sprinkler! I still remember him looking with such concentration and telling me that nothing was happening!! 8-)

The other funny thing happened when I went to get the staples out - the nurse said she liked my piercing!!! I said that they were actually the staples she had to remove - go figure!!

1 comment:

  1. Sharon, you need to look at what Dr Sandra Cabot says about thyroid function, especially when tests show you are within 'normal' range, but you feel like you are under- or over- functioning. You've probably got her books in your library.

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