It has
been a while since I have posted, because there hasn’t been much going on on
the cancer side of things. I can now give you a quick update.
I have
been having some nasty pain in my hands and knees, and we had thought that it
might be a side effect of one of my medications, Tamoxifen. When I saw my
oncologist recently, I told him it was still very bothersome. I asked him when
we might start investigating to make sure something worse wasn’t going on,
specifically rheumatoid arthritis or some such thing. “Now,” he said, and he sent me off to a
big-shot rheumatologist.
I am
happy to report that I don’t have rheumatoid arthritis. Nor is it a side effect
of the tamoxifen. What I have in my hands is good old-fashioned osteoarthritis,
like my grandma had. Only, I am 50 and she was a lot older than that. But if I
live to be 101 like she did, my hands are going to be a mess. I have bought
mass quantities of Aleve. Life goes on.
The
knees are another story. My left knee is giving me all kinds of problems. As it
turns out, the problem there is not arthritis at all, but something involving
my kneecap being in the wrong place. Ouch! This problem is apparently very
common and is not fixed with drugs but with lots of physical therapy. This will
commence in August. The only bright side is:
in the meantime, I am strictly forbidden from doing squats, lunges and
other things like that where my knee makes me want to scream in pain. My doctor circled this in red ink and drew arrows around it. My trainer, Mija,
is grumpy about this.She enjoys making me do squats very much. Oh well.
Now, when I saw my oncologist, the other thing he had said was, it really was time for me to get a
colonoscopy. He said that is one test that is known to save many many lives. Period.
I had had one several years back, when one of my brothers was
diagnosed with colon cancer, and my test then came back clean. But I turned 50
this year. And it seems that my immune system is slacking at the cellular
level, which can lead to not only breast
cancer but skin cancer, colon cancer, etc. So the oncologist wanted it done. Last week,
I bit the bullet and did it. The results came back clean. But they want me back in five
years, not the usual ten.
Here is a picture of all the stuff they make you chug before a colonoscopy. It made my Weight Watchers number very happy the next day, I can report:
The one
part that was a bummer was trying to get an IV in my poor arm. Since
all the chemotherapy two years ago, my veins don’t cooperate any more. It took two nurses and
an anesthesiologist a total of six tries to get an IV going. Twice, they
started one only to have it fail, and they had to do it again. By the end of
that performance, I was crying and shaking. Here is what my arm looks like, a
week later:
I am here to tell you the colonoscopy itself was nothing. Even the prep wasn't too bad. If you are supposed to get one, GO GET ONE! I can't tell you how much easier a colonoscopy is than chemotherapy. Just do it.
