Benign...But Unusual

I'm thinking those aren't the greatest words coming out of a doctor's mouth. Pretty typical of my life, but still not comforting, ya know?

So, My biopsy. Not so much a cyst, as thought. I have a lymphoid hyperplasia. Which essentially means that when I complain that I have a tumor, Isaac can no longer say I've never had a tumor again. Wheeeee! It's apparently a benign cluster of white blood cells. He used the example that you can have two suspicious moles - one comes up melanoma, one comes up benign. This cluster has a cancer counterpart, but is not cancer itself. It is usually a result of an insect / spider bite, but can also just show up with some unknown reason. (As an aside...since it first showed up this fall, during our tenure in the spider house, I'm wondering if I got a spider bite I didn't know about...) The doctor said that the act of the biopsy itself usually breaks it up and clears it up, but not always. That's best case.

I have a follow up in a few weeks and if it's not cleared with the healing of my stitches, we'll start cortisone shots. From there it's just watching for any others to pop up (wouldn't be surprising) and go from there. He did mention that while it CAN turn into a lymphoma, it's extremely rare and, again, he's not worried about it at all. They ran extra tests, just to double check the benign-ness.

I'm being spiritually reminded to trust that the tests were correctly analyzed. To trust that this will clear on its own. To trust that it will not be one of those extremely rare cases and turn into any form of cancer. To trust the doctor, follow his advice and trust I'll be fine. That is the hardest part of all of this for me. The trust. The faith. NOT getting stuck and tripped up on the possibility of the rare, worst case. Focusing on the good news and moving on, embracing the benign.

Week in Pictures

I recently read somewhere of a goal to take at least one picture a day all year. The goal being that by the end of the year you will have random snapshots capturing your year. I liked it. I'm going to try it. So I think Fridays will become my week in pictures. We'll see how it goes...

Saturday - my new water pitcher in my bathroom. LOVE!


Sunday - uh...I forgot. Already. I'm seeing that Sunday will be tricky!

Monday - Sammy and the grocery store.


Tuesday - my biopsied shoulder and bonus of Sammy reading Monster at the End of This Book on the iPad (because he's cuter than my shoulder...)



Wednesday - My MAC stash came (the stock of "my" color, plus, uh, LOTS of audition colors...)


Thursday - A shot of our dresser. I (ok, well Isaac...I still can't raise my arm well) hung the new print that morning. I LOVE it. From here.



(pictures of matchstick men, camper van beethoven)

Man Vs. Food

I wanna talk about Bruges a little more. Because I think it may have been glossed over in all my Christmas talk, when it should shine on its own. Let's start with Pierre, the owner. He was SO nice. He chatted with everyone and explained about the menu and was funny and just generally delightful.

Next, the food. Sunday morning, as Isaac was making breakfast, he pulled out a "mmmmm...bruges..." ala Homer Simpson on me. Both of us have been doing the same since Christmas Eve, at least once a week. We're dying to go back and are trying to come up with a good excuse. I can't tell you how lovely that vanilla waffle was and I'm still daydreaming about the waffle my friend got. You know, the one with two whole chocolate bars shoved in the middle and topped with creme fraiche. It was stuff heaven MUST be made of.

So during one of my day dreams, I stumbled onto this. How did I miss this the first time it was on? I love Man vs. Food! That sandwich? Totally what Isaac had. And it was good, but apparently eating it all gives one heartburn. Or so I hear...


(man vs food, salt lake city part 1)

Do you wanna go now? How 'bout now? Now? Mmmmm....waffles and frites...I see random trips once the weather is better, in my future. DEFINITELY.


(love you madly - cake)

The Music in My Mind

What are the lyrics that just BLOW you away? Or leave you breathless? Mine change constantly, with a few that remain steady. Lately, the ones that change include these...

Crowded House, Either Side of the World:

"Sometimes I try to hard
To overcome
Sometimes I think too much,
Wish I could've held my tongue."

I love that it's a very upbeat sounding song, but isn't as uplifting when you break down the lyrics. Why? Because Neil Finn is genius. That's why. Love.

Leave - the swell season:


"the truth has a habit of fallin out of your mouth"

That may be the single best lyric of my life, right now. Guts me every time.

The World Spins Madly On - the weepies:


"Everything that I said I'd do
Like make the world brand new
And take the time for you
I just got lost and slept right through the dawn
And the world spins madly on"

Brilliant.

My FAVORITE 2 sets that NEVER change, though, come from Distant Sun by Crowded House.

I don't know any lyrics, for me, that top this:

"You're still so young to travel so far
Old enough to know who you are
Wise enough to carry the scars
Without any blame, there's no one to blame"

"And I'm lying on a table
Washed out in a flood
Like a Christian fearing vengeance from above
I don't pretend to know what you want
But I offer love"

See? LOVE.

Doctor Post Script

So...my dermatologist appointment this morning was a *little* more involved than a check up. Instead, I'm now sporting a pretty, pretty water bandage over four stitches. Wheeeeee!

This spot on my shoulder (which has been there for a couple of months) was enough to get biopsied. He STILL doesn't think there is anything to worry about and mentioned he was 95% certain it was a benign sweat gland cyst type thing and WAS NOT CONCERNED FOR A SECOND about it and even gave me the option of no biopsy and just watch and wait for the next six months. I felt so very on the spot and my mind tumbled a million different ways.

What IF it WASN'T a benign cyst type thingie? What if his 5% turns out to be the thing that happens and I wait? What if it IS a benign cyst thingie and I have him biopsy and have a gaping hole in my shoulder when I should have just waited and had it resolve on its own? What if the stitches get infected and end up causing a bigger problem than the whole of the spot? WHAT IF...???

And then I heard myself say, "Well if there is ANY chance, we may as well biopsy it now rather than waiting to have it biopsied in six months" and before you could say ouch, I had a hole in my shoulder and I was watching a gigantic half circle needle criss-crossing the wound. I immediately regretted my decision, which is so unlike me. I wanted to scream WAIT and chose the wait and watch option. I felt a little panicky, for some reason. But it was done and over with by that time and I had nothing to do but stare at bloody gauze and a hunk of my shoulder floating in a specimen cup.

Another point that is so unlike me, as well, is that I'm feeling pretty numb toward it now. NOW is the point where I am usually FAH-REAKING out, convinced they will find stage 100 cancer and I'll be dead within a week, if not immediately upon hearing the word. But instead? Eh. I'm not worried. I'm a little concerned that it won't be the easy option, but mostly, I'm having a hard time conjuring up my give a crap. Side effect from therapy? Or stupid biology reverse psychology because this really IS the one time something is wrong? (Great. Now I'm worried that my body is really good at playing the opposite game. Nothing to worry about = giant freak out / something to worry about = zen like eh. GREAT.)

Results Monday. Stitches out in a couple of weeks. Coldstone's chocolate decadence consumed. Netflix for this afternoon on deck. I can tell that the shoulder is starting to wake up and I *think* it's not very happy with my decision AT ALL.

Instead of my usual song, I leave you with this. Footage of the Australian floods. My brother and sister in law, while not immediately in the thick of it right now (see not evacuated from their home), do live near here, in a suburb of Brisbane. And have dug barricades and trenches around their home. And my sister in law was evacuated from work. Which all equals scary, no good things.

Doctors Upon Doctors...

I feel as though doctors SHOULD have been my word of the year. At least my word for January. In the first 20 days of January, I'll have seen five different ones (or medical professional equivalents), with one being repeated weekly, for at least this month. Sheesh! I call uncle.

I had an appointment with a specialist for my condition. One thing I've NEVER had with this condition, which is pretty common, is insomnia, but for the past month-ish? Cannot sleep. Well, that's not true. I can sleep fine, but it's not restful and I wake up exhausted. There's a fancy pants term for it, but all I know is it SUCKS. I've always been able to shake a flare with sleep, so this is a most unwelcome development and I'm not ashamed to say that I'm not handling it well. At all. So I go and see this doctor and guess what? He's horrid. We left the appointment thinking...is that it? Really? Isaac had come with me because I had thought that it would be illuminating: things to try, what he's found that works, steps to take to live with this, etc. Eh. I felt I knew more than he did and when a doctor dismisses you (literally) without answering your two specific questions by saying, "Well, it seems you've read all about it, so keep doing what you're doing. There isn't really anything else and really, you seem to have a very mild case", I kinda got a little twitchy. It's one thing to dismiss you, say there isn't more I can do and still look kind and good and it's a completely 'nuther thing to just be a jerk about it. He falls in the jerk category and I really wish there was some way I could just say, "Yeah, you did NOTHING and barely even listened to me, so I'm not paying for this appointment". Alas...Needless to say, I still don't have an answer to the not sleeping, but I'm hopeful hypnotherapy will help with that as well. (The good news is it HAS gotten better lately. Yay!)

Today I have a dermatologist follow up. I've had some sort of viral spot on my shoulder since Halloween and, even though it looks nearly cleared (FINALLY), we're doing one more check. So yesterday I get a call. I was in the middle of cleaning the pantry, checked the number and when I saw it was their office, assumed it was a reminder call and ignored it. Imagine my surprise when I called back in the afternoon and it was them wanting to bump my appointment because AFTER I made this follow up someone double booked the doctor. After completely failing to see how that was my problem, I said, no, I can't change to just after lunch due to childcare arrangements. And they still continued to...beg? Ask if there was ANY WAY I could change, even once I told them that my own doctor husband had arranged his schedule to accommodate the scheduled time and I could not ask him to cancel on HIS patients to help them. It was truly flummoxing. I get that someone messed up. And I'm truly sympathetic that it will make his morning a little crazy and possibly make me late for MY appointment, but I don't need to know all of this. A simple call asking if it is possible to change times. When I say no? Figure it out WITHOUT me being on the phone for your thought process. Please.

At least my hypnotherapy is going well. And I have one more appointment this month to make up for the less than stellar ones. Because, dude. I'm not having the best of times, here.


(doctor doctor, thompson twins)

Book Club

I stopped reviewing our book club books months ago. I'm not sure why. I still read. I still have thoughts. We still get together. We still laugh. But something has happened...I've become so very protective of my little club. Who knew?

So last Thursday was an EPIC book club. I don't think there's ever been a time that we all laughed for three hours straight. Or wanted to adopt a waiter to restaurant hop with us every month. Or have another waitress ask to join our club. Or had an (shall we call it in depth?) discussion about the, uh, colorful side of using Valium. Or been served something from Better Off Dead and not really mind. Well, asked for a replacement dressing, but still. It was funny.



I think that what really happened was that we all needed this so very much. We all have trials in our lives. We all have a full plate of worry and real life. But for three hours once a month, we let it all go. When I started this group, I had in mind what I wanted to have happen. But when asked, all I would say is that I would like a group of like minded women to be able to talk about books and become friends. However, what I REALLY wanted was to cultivate a group of women who were there for each other, who developed life long friendships and who would be able to be completely authentic with each other...you know, a movie book club. And that, it seems, is what has happened. Except with extra crazy.

And this just pretty much sums up our evenings. The cake! The water/wine bottles! The absolute silliness!

(should I come up with aliases to protect the guilty?)

I want to start talking books, again, though. So. If you ARE still playing along, our next book is Major Pettigrew's Last Stand. We'll see how the next restaurant fares with us!


(like to get to know you well, howard jones)