In short, FML.

Dear Reader(s),

Well, despite my valiant superheroic efforts on my diet, the evil thyroid cancer has one-upped me yet again. The good news is that this blog just got more interesting. The bad news is that this blog just got more interesting.

I arrived in my hometown on Monday for an ultrasound, followed by a blood test yesterday, and was scheduled to take my radioactive iodine tomorrow morning. I had expected these tests to simply be routine and to go ahead with my RAI as planned.

No cancer-fighting superhero should ever make this assumption. Let that be noted.

I received a phone call from my endocrinologist at about noon today saying that she had canceled my RAI appointment for tomorrow. Apparently my ultrasound showed an irregular lymph node on the right hand side of my neck that my endo wants to have biopsied before we continue with treatment. If it is benign, we can go ahead and reschedule my RAI, if not then I get to have more surgery! Yay!! Just the thing I very most wanted!!

You, dear reader, will not be surprised to hear that I am pissed. Not at my doctor, who is just doing her job, or really at anyone in particular, but simply pissed off in general. Mostly due to the fact that my boyfriend's and my one-year anniversary is in a few days, and we had planned on him taking the 18th-20th off from work and coming down to my hometown to spend what would have been the last day of my isolation with my family and then go out for a nice dinner and spend a night in a hotel once I was released from lockdown. Now, of course, this is completely ruined. We had a room reservation and everything. The worst part is that said boyfriend recently took a full-time position at work, which makes it now infinitely harder - and it was hard before - for him to get time off at all. He took said position for the benefits, but doesn't receive any of them for another three months while he is on a "probationary period". So basically he gets zero vacation or sick days until October. Which means the whole anniversary thing is totally fucked. Plus if I do need surgery there's probably no way he can come and be with me for any of it. Awesome.

Not only that, of course, but I now have to inform both of my workplaces that I will not be returning when I said I would be, and in fact do not know when I will be back at all. And of course I have to be on the Diet From Hell AND off of my medication for even longer - and lemme tell you, I've been feeling super great without my little happy pills lately.

Thyroid cancer, you are a bitch.

You see, dear reader(s), this is ultimately the worst part of having cancer, at least in my opinion. All I want is to live my life and make my plans like every other person on the planet, and I feel like every time I try or make any sort of headway I just get knocked flat on my ass again. Over and over and over.

People don't seem to understand why it bothers me when they say that my cancer has a "cure" rather than a "highly effective treatment". "Not a cure- well, what's the difference?" they might ask. This is the difference. This right here. When you cure something, you give someone a pill and it does not come back. They don't revolve their lives, their careers, and their relationships around something that could literally do whatever the fuck it wants at any given time regardless of what plans you make or what you want to do. A highly effective treatment is great, and I am immensely grateful that radioactive iodine works so well, because it means I don't really have to worry that I'll be dead five years from now. At least, not from this. But calling it a cure denies the instability of my disease and denies all the time that my family and friends and I have spent in exactly this situation, hearing "I don't know" and "we can tell you when we get the test results back" and all the rearranging we've had to do to structure our entire lives around a disease that, no, does NOT. HAVE. A CURE.

So there's my little cancer patient rant for today. I'm sure there will be many more to come. Stay tuned for updates - I'm going to try and keep information posted when I get it.

All I know is if I have to have another goddamn surgery I'm gonna freakin' scream.

Love,
RG.