Did I say last time, that this is it, definitely, hysterectomy for me? Yes, of course, I did! Well, it seems that the root of my problems over the last few years has not been adenoymosis, fibroid or anything like that, but simply an chronic infection of my uterus (endometritis) !  So I am now on antibiotics for the next couple of weeks, no hysterectomy and ,assuming I don’t have any further problems, on to the menopause.  God, I hope it is that simple! Given that I have been told so many things in the last 5 yrs, it hard to believe it could be cured by simple dose of penicillin.  To be honest, I am really tired of this saga, 10 fecking years I have been have hot flushes and night sweats, why was nature so cruel to us?

The other saga in my life is my constant battle with weight and with the clearing of a lot of our stuff into storage for what seems forever (will anyone even look – only one person so far in 8 wks!) and look what I found from my college days.

Yes, even in at college I was obsessing with my weight and exercise, not that it has helped one little bit. 

On the back of it in 1994, I recorded my weight in British stones and lbs.  The sad thing is that I have converted into the lbs I now use and realised that there is only few lbs difference for now to then! One day I will get back to the days of glory and weigh  the 130lbs I weighed before I had kids.  Unfortunately at the time, I was convinced I was huge and had a terrible eating disorder (bulimia) – what a wasted youth I had!

and just can not seem to concertrate on anything at the moment.

Update on my last post:  my biopsy results came back clear as expected but in the end I have decided to go ahead with the hysterectomy as I still have problems with adenomyosis which can only resolved by a hysterectomy or menopause.  Having gone through the last 5 yrs of doctors telling me that(menopause)  is only around the corner, I should be more patient but to be honest I am not a patient person.  So on Monday, I will be seeing the Doctor about having a hysterectomy and what my options are.  At least with the biopsy results, I know that will be the end of it!

Last Friday, I finally gave in my notice at Joann’s and I am not sad at all. I think the frame shop will collapse without Georgia being there but I think it will cope fine without me there. Hopefully they will find someone like Georgia who is good at organizing and keeping the place ship shape so Nev can do what she does best and loves – designing frames.

My sister is fine and is awaiting more tests but like she has been all her life, she unperturbed by her latest battle with health.

On the upside,I have been accepted to train as a Docent at the Blanton Museum of Art.  I have been thinking about doing it for a while so when they annonced they had new program starting in the fall, I applied straight away.  Its going to be quite a challenge as I am useless at public speaking (although I have gotten better as I get older) and get very tongue tied with words, especially foreign names.  So I am going to have to develope some sort of crips sheet so I can at least attempt to pronounce names like Julio Alpuy and the accompanying titles , Marina metafísica.

as I saw not one 2nd opinion doctor this week but 2!  Boy! am I glad i did that because it turns out I probably wont need a hysterectomy at all.  Went to  the 1st doctor on Wednesday, told him my story about the D&C not actually happening because my doctor couldn’t get pass the cervix.  So he had a look and said should be able to do a guided D&C (using a sonogram) no problem, could  clearly see my cervix.  Also said despite the thicken endometrial lining he really didn’t think I was a candidate for anything serious like cancer. Whew! that was a relief.

Yesterday was Doctor No2.   First thing she said was “Dr C has terrible handwriting!”   Anyway related my story, cervix not opening, probably due to ablation done in 2004, blah blah.   She was puzzled “why couldn’t she get pass the cervix, it says here that she has done 2 endometrial biopsies in the recent past, which means she got pass the cervix at that time? Also you have recently had bleeding ( hence the need for D&C)  so your cervix was open then!’  Basically she dished my Doctor.   Next she said ” it (the uterus) has to be sampled, if it can’t be sampled it has to come out”  but she was pretty confident that she could do an inoffice endometrial biopsy right then.  And she was right!  No only that, she was so quick it was literally like a long pinch as she promised.  When she finished  she was almost jumping for joy like a football player who had just scored the winning touchdown! She was so refreshingly down to earth and natural.  So now I have to wait for the results but like the doctor on Wednesday, she felt that I had a very low risk of anything adverse being found and if  it was anything, could probably be controlled by hormones.  I am so relieved and last night I was so happy.

Then this morning,  I had to go to work.  Yeah, a lot of people say that, you are still working for Joann’s?  Yep, I am sometimes, not often and usually only for 4-5 hours every other week.   I walk in and see a pile of freight for me to unload.  Boy! was I pissed off!  To be honest, I had been using the hysterectomy as an excuse for giving my notice in but now suddenly that option has been taken away from me (yes, I am that confident).   I hate letting people down and I know that Nev is facing the prospect of losing her 2 assistants ( Georgia is being promoted to full-time management in another part of the store). However, Georgia has made no secret of the fact she didn’t plan on staying in the frame shop if the opportunity came up for a management position and given the turnover in that place, it was just a matter of time.  Me, I am just fed up with the last resort person who fills in for 4 hours here or there.  So I am going to give in my notice but now it wont have the excuse of a hysterectomy with it (which is a relief, a real plus )

Other than work, I was pretty down on Wednesday, despite the good news from the Doctor because as I soon as I got on the Internet, my sister’s almost daughter- in- law was telling me,  Julie had been taken into hospital with chest pains, probable heart attack     As it turns out it wasn’t a heart attack but angina which is pretty serious in itself. Poor Julie, really drew the short straw in the health genes amongst the sisters.  Really bad eczema and asthma  when she was a kid which led to lengthy stays in hospital all her childhood.  It was also the time of experimenting with new medications for asthma, amongst them steroids.   She was about 14 at the time and a very skinny kid when they first put her on steroids.  Within 6 months she had double in size and her asthma was worse.   I don’t think her body has recovered since. Of course she is like all of us, like her food but she doesn’t really drink much  or smoke. The root cause of her problems were the experimental drugs they gave her as a teenager as she has never been the skinny Julie of our childhood again. Fingers crossed that they can control the angina

I waited patiently for my Doctor to call on Monday without any joy until the middle of the afternoon when I broke.  I had to call the office twice before she decided to call me back.  It was then she said that the cervical biopsy she had done last Thursday was a pretty useless test to do as it would tell her nothing about my uterus (I already knew that, so why do it?) So she suggested doing another ultrasound in late July/August or a hysterectomy.  So I  said “if you were me, what would you do?”  Without hesitation, she said hysterectomy.  So I agreed to that and then she shocked me by saying she thought it would best if I had vaginally as it was the least invasive procedure.   Yeah, it might be the least invasive but it also not recommend if there is even the slightest hint there might be cancer involved. Anyway, I let it ride (whilst quietly steaming inside) and she left saying she would get her scheduler to arrange things.

When Gordon came in that evening, I asked him to repeat exactly what she had told him on Thursday. The clearest thing he remembers (he is an engineer so is use to listening very carefully) is the fact she was suggesting a special xray with fluid and that we really don’t want to go the route of hysterectomy unless it was necessary.  This just confirmed what I had be thinking the few times I have visited the doctor, every visit with her has been contradictory and I have to tell her what is happening with my history because it like she has never seen me before!  I really should have followed my instincts a year ago and gone to another doctor.

I have now contacted a local gyn/onc office after I contacted my gyn and said I wanted a referral. She said to me that there might be quite a wait as they are very busy and maybe she could consult with the gyn/onc as that might be quicker. As I have lost all faith in her, I declined the offer. The doctor’s scheduler/nurse contacted me within a couple of hours after I left a message and after I related my story said she would be getting my records immediately. So hopefully I will have an appointment soon although it might take awhile as they need to get my records faxed over plus all the sonagram pictures.

In the meantime, we had another drama happening.  Gordon was taking the dog for his usual evening stroll and as he was leaving decided to turn on the sprinklers.  As he turned the corner to put on the water, there were 3 cats on the lawn.  2 left immediately to hide in the storm drains where they live but the other one just stayed put.   As Gordon bend down to switch on the water, the cat reared up, arched his back and then ran straight at Gordon, clawing and biting at his lower  leg.  It let go briefly to try to attack Angus. Gordon let go of his lead and Angus just ran!  The cat then decided to attack Gordon again! Needless to say we were straight down to ER and pretty much shocked that a cat had attacked Gordon unprovoked.

This morning, animal control came around and managed to identify that the cat belong to our neighbour who lets it roam around the neighbour (and is the father of all the strays around here by the looks of it). Unfortunately the neighbour doesn’t remember the last time the cat had a rabies shot so we are waiting on animal control to confirm that via Travis or Williamson County records.  Fortunately a rabies shot lasts 3 yrs despite the insistent on the counties around here on a yearly shot.  Apparently there is 72 hr window for you to get rabies prevention and they are very painful but unless we can get proof the cat has been vaccinated,  you really can’t take the chance, especially as its very strange behaviour for a cat, to say the least!

On top of that,  Alan has contracted a staph  infection and he has these huge blisters on his hand plus smaller ones on his body. One of the things the doctor recommended was checking  his temperature. So when he called yesterday, I said to him, so have you been checking for skin for red streaks and your temperature, only to discover he couldn’t check his temperature as he didn’t have a thermometer! So I went straight to a shop once I finished work and took one  to him.  However, he seemed ok, will check on him a little later today but hopefully the antibiotics will kick in straight away.

Well, it seems they were unable to do the D&C with hysteroscope this morning as the Doctor could not get it past my cervix.  So now I am waiting on the Doctor calling and letting me know where we go next. She did do an endometrial biopsy but whether it will have any endometrial  material  is debatable as she wasn’t able to get any last time.

Gordon seem to think that the Doctor wasn’t in a rush to do a hysterectomy which is understandable as its a major procedure but on the other hand she is telling me she is concerned it might be cancer. Apparently she is suggesting some sort of x-ray to determine the shape of the cystic space, teardrop or circular?

Having done my hypochondriac best, from what I can gather a cystic structure in the myometrial is most likely to be adenomyosis but the best way to find out is via a D&C or hysterectomy. Oh, well, the saga continues. I feel like my life has been hold for the last five years because of this, so what will a few months matter.

Tomorrow I will post a more upbeat post about my week of fun with Sophie.

For the first time since we have lived here the first day of the fest was rained out but boy! did  it make for a nice day on Sunday.  The sun was shining weakly and there was a cool breeze that kept the temps in the mid 80’s until the rest of the week.  It was great, sitting on the bleachers, sipping beer and listening to great music.

Here is a little taste of what we listened to - Caroline Wonderland and her band

Since the weekend, Emily has arrived home for a few weeks before her classes start again.   I don’t think she can complain she has been bored this week as I got her painting her bedroom back to a nice off white colour.  I,  in turn, was painting Alan’s old room back to a nice off white colour.  It was a nightmare covering all that dark/ mid blue colour he had before.  Must admit it looks a lot more spacious now. Next task is the bunk room, games room and the stairwell but they should be easier as they are already off white.  Just trying to get them to look new again!

Well, I must admit the nerves are a starting to hit about the D&C and although I have rationalised it all my head that it most likely to be case of hyperpalsia,  it doesn’t stop the what ifs.   So I am really glad that the coming week is going to be full.  Tomorrow I am actually working,  Sunday not so sure what we will be doing but hopefully we will have people looking around the house, Monday, Elisabeth and Sophie come through .  Sophie is Elisabeth’s best friend from Scotland.  Unfortunately Elisabeth has to work Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday but lucky for us Sophie is coming to stay with us.   So Tuesday we will probably take Sophie to Austin plus I have my pre-op appointment. Wednesday we are going to Schlitterbahn and Thursday, I have my op so Gordon will probably take her somewhere as I will be out of it for most of the day light hours I am sure.  With all that I wont have time to worry about things I have no control about.

See you next week after the big day

our House

So living with me at the moment is not easy and I feel really sorry for Gordon as I don’t cope with stress very well at the best of time.  Add house selling and a minor female surgery to the mix and my moods are bouncing off the walls!

Just like to add a bit to my last post as it might seem I was being a bit baize about the whole D&C thing and cancer.  As I was trying to explain to my colleague at work yesterday, in a way the internet is a good and bad thing for some one like me who has a tendency to hypochondria.  You can get a lot of crap on the internet which will scare the shit out of you as all your symptoms point to the this horrible condition and you become convinced you are going to die.  On the other hand there wonder sites like Hystersisters where they give common sense advice and place for you to voice your concerns.  No one is going to call you daft to worry but they will reassure you that you are not being paranoid.

Blogs are also another wonderful source of inspiration because by chance from time to time you will come across one where the person is going through what you would consider hell on earth.  However, what always shines through is the indomitable spirit of these people to fight on regardless of what the prognosis is.

Of beads and other things - a personal blog who is a member of the Bead Journal group I belong to.

Janet Bates a wonderful musician based in Oregon

Anyway the upshots, is that because of all the information at my disposal, I know that even if cancer is discovered it would be all likelihood in its early stage as I have been closely monitored for the last 5 yrs and 95% of all early uterine cancer are cured.   Its not stopping me from stressing about the actual D &C procedure as I react to anesthesia sometimes  and annoyance  that yet again my body is putting some personal plans on the back burner for now.  So anyway the D&C is on 28th May,  so for the next 2 wks or so I will very  stressed and unreasonable.