The Silence of Our Friends

Personal updates

I know some of you have been following my adventures and thought I better give a bit of an update.

The biopsy went fine. The results are different than I expected, I think. They said it's fibroadenosis, which I think is different than sclerosing adenosis. It's benign and as you might guess I'm happy about that.

Since I've decided to take this whole blogging thing seriously and continue, I better tell a little more about myself. I'm not a healthy person. I've had degenerative disc disease for several years and have three herniated discs in my neck that have gotten progressively worse over the years. At first when I had a flare up I could take prednisone for a few days and be painfree for months afterwards. That's not working anymore. I've also had epidural injections, physical therapy, and various meds for pain. I'm due to go into see a neurologist for a second opinion, an orthopedic surgeon recommended fusion. I'm not thrilled with the idea of having surgery especially since I have heard that in Europe and other areas of the world people are having disc replacement surgery but it's not FDA approved yet here. I was hoping to hold out until it was approved because I understand you have full use of your spine instead of having an area fused together and it appears that I would need at least two fusions/replacements. I also heard that healing is much faster since the replacement disc operates the same as the original so you don't need to wait for the bone to graft together as in a fusion.

The reason I thought it was important for people to know about this is because there are days when I feel "stupid". It is due to whether I need more or less vicodin to function during the day. So if it appears that I am not making sense, it's probably because I have had a little more vicodin than normal that day. The worst effect is my memory, I can't think of words I would commonly use. That's when I know I should get offline. LOL It's much worse in person and I'm taking my time speaking or having to explain what I mean because I can think of the right damned word! I also have a hard time following a single train of thought, which actually is fairly normal for me, but exaggerated when I'm having a bad day. (I had to sit for about a minute to remember the word exaggerated just now, and turned to my son to ask him, "What was that thing called when I got those shots in my neck?" so that he could tell me epi-something to remind me that it's epidural.)

I'm hoping that people will be willing to give me a little latitude and ask me to restate myself in those moments when I'm not especially clear. I'm self confident enough to think that I am not really stupid and do have worthwhile things to say, but I also am becoming more and more aware of how badly the vicodin is affecting me and my ability to concentrate and communicate.

The last piece of personal news, my sister seems to be taking the break with our father well and has mostly accepted it. I still talk to her almost every day, but we aren't dwelling on him anymore. But she talked to my husband yesterday and found out that I never did read his last nasty letter. My husband read it and told me not to. He knows me well enough to know how angry I would get, how much it would hurt, etc and I've taken his advice. My sister told me today to just shred it. My husband is leaning that way too, but so far I can not bring myself to do it. I don't know if one day I will want to know what my father said, hurtful or not. I guess I would like some outside opinions from people who are fairly objective. Would you stick it in the bottom of a drawer and mostly forget it, in case the day comes when you feel you really need to know. Or just get rid of the poison?

Geez, I know it sounds like my life is so depressing since I've only been talking about the bad. It's not really that awful. The vicodin means that I can function most days. The biopsy results were good. Health insurance to pay for the poking and prodding. No one is wailing and moaning over dear old dad anymore. I have a lovable husband and two perfect sons. I've just finished reading Pride and Prejudice while "recuperating". We are finally replacing the nasty carpet in our basement (it's partially finished) on monday. We saw "The Departed" at the movies last night (it was really good!) And Detroit is in the World Series. Ok, I don't really care about that, but my husband who was born and raised in Michigan does. When he is happy so am I. So Detroit better tie the series up tonight. I also have a cat. It's a good life with lots to be thankful for.

posted by Donna at 9:26 PM |