Thyroidectomy: Coming Soon!

Bethumped With Words, food, nature walk, music, movies, ice cream, swimming, cook-out, fireworks, thrift store, Twins game, Mall of America, bickering, stress, nerves, tension, kids, cuteness, dancing, home-made parades, sickness, tears, goodbyes. That is my weekend in a nutshell. And what a weekend it was. It's funny after it's all over and you look back on it, you realize that you were in the midst of greatness. It's also funny after it's all over and you look back on it, how much you're glad that it's all over. I love my family and all, but I'm just sayin'. And for the record, we all agree on this. You can only have so many great personalities and strong opinions in the same place for so long. I will say that I learned a lot about my egotistical, proud self. Something to work on.

In the way of medical updates, my thyroidectomy is Friday. They will re-open my previous incision and lengthen it several inches. That just sounds lovely. Fortunately, I'm not a vain person because I will have a nice scar on my neck. I didn't think much of it until I thought I heard several girls sitting behind me in the Twins stadium talking about how disgusting my incision was (maybe I was being super paranoid). It really doesn't bother me, except that I don't want to cause anybody to toss their cookies at the sight of my neck. Just not the kind of effect I like to have on people. Oh well, such is life. It will be what it will be. After some of the other possibilities, I think I can stand grossing people out for the rest of my life. I like that sentence.

Anyway, along with the thyroid, they are removing the rest of the lymph nodes with cancer in them. The doctor had just removed one for the biopsy and left the rest for the next surgery because he thought he could get to them better from that angle, what with the jugular vain and all. I was pleased with this decision to say the least. The risks involved are cutting the vocal chord nerves and damaging or removing the parathyroids which would affect my calcium levels or something like that. To be honest, these risks don't bother me in the least bit. In fact, my husband is a little excited that I might lose my vocal chords. Seriously though, when you hear about people going into surgery with a 20% chance of survival, you kind of lose your ability to get worked up over your vocal chords and calcium.

You want to know what I'm really not looking forward to? A blood clot pressing against my throat again. I'll have to say, that was not the least bit enjoyable. Anyway, I'm trying to keep all things in perspective here and am actually succeeding quite well, thanks to your prayers and an awesome God.