Some good medical news, for a change

Yesterday’s mammogram wasn’t quite as uncomfortable as usual, but more importantly, I got some good news.  The rad tech told me that the calcium deposits we’ve been monitoring for the past 2 years haven’t changed so I can go back to annual screening mammograms.  No more semi-annual diagnostic mammos! 

The tech did give me a bit of a scare, though.  She called me back into the room and closed the door, “for privacy.”  I immediately thought it was going to be bad news.  What a relief when it turned out to be good news!

Big week ahead!

SO many appointments tomorrow!  First stop will be the lab, to give them some blood to play with.  Then it’s Endocrinology for my first of 2 injections of thyrogen in preparation for my RAI (radioactive iodine).  That’s my morning.  In the afternoon I have my mammogram 😖, followed by a Podiatry appointment.  With luck, he’ll be able to figure out why my ankles, and now my feet, keep swelling.

Tuesday I go back for my 2nd thyrogen shot, then to Nuclear Medicine for a radioactive contrast dye, both in preparation for Wednesday.

Wednesday is the day I get nuked! First they do a full-body scan to see where any stray thyroid or cancel cells may be lurking.  The NucMed doc then sends my RAI order to the pharmacy.  When that comes back, they give me the pill, keep me for 20-30 minutes for observation, then send me home to quarantine.   Video visits will be welcome, and definitely more interesting than whatever I’ll be streaming. ☺️

Fabulous fall day!

The weather was gorgeous - sunny and mild - so the Chief and I drove out to a favorite farm stand some 35 or so miles away.  The excuse was so I could buy myself a pumpkin or two for baking.  We also ended up coming home with a butternut squash, a couple of jars of preserves, a scarecrow doll, 2 of the biggest carrots I’ve ever seen (the Chief joked they were baseball bats), and a couple of pies.

The trees were turning, the farmland was beautiful - all in all, it was a perfect day for a drive in the countryside, the kind you wish you could box up and store away for when you need a lift.

Found an LID recipe that's a keeper

Tonight I tried a third recipe from the LID cookbook.  The first 2 were just kinda meh, but tonight's dinner - chicken w/ apricot sauce - is a keeper.  It's not as sweet as it sounds, because the recipe calls for ginger with the apricot, and I also added a dash of cumin.  It was easy, too - I cooked some chicken thighs in olive oil, then cooked a shredded onion in the drippings, added the apricot preserves (Bonne Maman in this case, because the commissary didn't have Polaner), ginger and cumin, poured the sauce over the chicken, and there ya go.  Was really good over couscous and with roasted fresh asparagus.

My system is confused.

It seems that getting your thyroid out messes up your hormones or lymphatic system or something.  I find myself getting occasional hot flashes (I thought I was past that!) and my ankles are quite swollen.  My PCP has ruled out gout and the OT I saw today doesn't think it's lymphedema, though that's what she put in my chart so that Kaiser will pay for compression socks.  I see a podiatrist on Monday; maybe he'll be able to figure out what's going on.  Mine aren't as swollen as in the photo but sometimes they do feel that big.

That's Day 1 of 12.

Yesterday wasn't too bad - oatmeal for breakfast, ratatouille ragu for lunch, and a slightly disappointing pork chop recipe for dinner.  (The apricot sauce was good but runny and the pork chops on the dry side.)  I missed my yogurt smoothie; the "no dairy" restriction may be the hardest part of this diet.

My veggie-beef soup recipe can be LID-friendly as long as I use no-salt-added tomatoes. I'll have to omit my mushroom stock and the tomato paste because of the probably iodized salt, but that's not a big deal.  I'll just use kosher salt and maybe some other seasonings from my collection.

And so it begins…

Today I start the low-iodine diet (LID) to prep for the radioactive iodine I’ll get next week.   It's not exactly off to a great start, as I managed to ruin some perfectly good homemade turkey soup by putting too much kosher salt in it.😥  Lesson learned - a little of that goes a long way.

Lunch will be some of the ratatouille ragu I made and froze in individual portions, and dinner will be pork chops in an apricot sauce.  That latter recipe I got from a cookbook put together by a thyroid cancer survivors organization.  It’s going to be helpful as I try to figure out what I can eat for the next couple of weeks.

Getting ready, mentally, for quarantine

Now that Macbeth is on its feet and I don't need to do anything more for them, my focus turns to this LID, which starts Monday and runs nearly two weeks (Oct. 26 thru Nov. 7).  That's this week.  Next week is chockablock - Monday: mammo, podiatry, and first pre-nuc injection.  Tuesday: 2nd pre-nuc injection and an imagery dose.  Wednesday:  pre-dose body scan, radioactive iodine (RAI) dose, then home and into isolation for a week.

I'll be spending my quarantine in our bedroom and using the back bathroom.  The Chief will be moving into the spare BR for the duration and using the front BA.  The "quarantine zone" will include a trash bag, a laundry basket, a TV table (for eating and for my laptop), my electronica and their chargers, and a big bag of lemon drops for the dry mouth I've been warned can come with the treatment.

At least having my electronics means I can videochat with people, even if in-person visits won't be safe.