DEAR THYROID^TM

Dear Thyroid,

Thyroid, did you know that i kinda hate you a little bit? well I don’t even have you after a total thyroidectomy/left neck dissection in September of 2011, but you know what I mean, right?

I’ve been dealing with thyroid problems before I even knew I had them. I had been sick since at least the summer of 2010 and I didn’t even know what was going on or why I was sick. My family thought i was crazy and all my doctor did when I started seeing her in the summer of 2011, right after I graduated no less, when I started seeing her and after multiple tests, she said that I had a mild case of depression and sent me home. A month later, I came back for a routine physical and she was checking my neck and she had noticed that I had a bump on the left side of my neck. So that day she sent me to go get an ultrasound and of course they confirmed that I indeed had a mass on the left lobe of my thyroid.

A few weeks after that, I had to come back for a biopsy, which was in itself a scary thing for me since I’m afraid of needles. They sent me home afterwords and then I began the long anxious wait to figure out if it was cancer or something else, and thankfully I didn’t have to wait very long because my doctor’s office called about a week and a half later and told me they wanted me to come in as soon as possible. I went in about three or four days later for my appointment and my doctor sat me down and handed me a box of tissues, so I knew she wasn’t going to tell me anything good, and she told me that I had thyroid cancer. After that she gave me a referral to an ENT doctor so that I could figure out where to go from there and, of course I didn’t know what to do since my mom was getting transferred the very next month while I was staying with my older sisters. After that I was totally lost and I didn’t know what I had done to deserve this. I would have days where I would just break down randomly and cry, and I didn’t have a clue what to do.

Around 2 weeks later me and my mom went to my appointment with the specialist and he did, yet another ultrasound  and found out that not only did I have a tumor on my thyroid, a bunch of the lymph nodes on the left side of my neck were also affected and I would need to have my whole thyroid and my lymph nodes removed, and the sooner the better. Let me just say one thing, my mom is the strongest person I know, period, but seeing her cry after she heard that was honestly the hardest thing that I had to go through, because she’s my hero and I love her to death. At the end of my appointment we had set up my surgery for the end of September. Those two weeks passed by incredibly fast and of course I was scared, but once I was in the pre-op room I felt this weird calm come over me and I went into surgery. The first thing I remember was getting wheeled to my room out of recovery and seeing basically everyone in my family. the next night I  was released and got to begin my long recovery.

Two months later, in the middle of November, after a very long wait, I got to go in for my radiation therapy, and let me tell you that was a very boring three days in the hospital. After that I went home, and went on with my life (kinda).

I still constantly worry that the cancer is going to come back and bite me in the butt, especially since I’ve been getting sick again and I’ve started seeing a new endocrinologist. It stresses me out endlessly, but all I can do right now is be thankful that I’m still alive and that it hasn’t beaten me. For that I guess I have to thank my old buddy thyroid.

Thanks,

Kerri

Tags: Dear Thyroid Letters, support for teens with thyroid cancer and disease, teens diagnosed with thyroid cancer, thyroid cancer, thyroid cancer community, thyroid cancer forum, thyroid cancer in teenagers, thyroid cancer patient feelings, thyroid cancer patient letters, thyroid cancer support, thyroid cancer treatment, Thyroidectomies

Follow Dear Thyroid on Twitter/@DearThyroid | See our Facebook Page | Become a Fan on Facebook | Join our Facebook Group

You Can Create a Dear Thyroid Profile and share with friends!