Monday 3 October 2011

Apathy

I received a reminder for my now annual breast ultrasound two weeks ago.  For those of you who have read this blog for a while you'll remember that my breasts are demented.  For years now I have been popping out cysts and lumps like a crazy woman.  I had one radiologist tell me my boobs were a garden. I had my GP tell me they are Swiss cheese.  I can feel lumps and bumps.  Big and small.  New and old.

But...

It sits on the table.  Waiting.

I know I have to get it done.
I know I have to become a teaching tool once more at my local radiology office.
I know I have a hope in hell of detecting a new potentially bad lump in a forest full of pretenders.
I know my GP will yell at me yet again for my apathy.

But......

I am over being scanned, poked, probed and examined.
I have had my fill of doctors.
I have had my fill of pills and potions.
I am over being a pharmaceutical guinea pig.
I am over shelling out money hand over fist, for no answers, or solutions.
I have had my fill of bad news.
I have had my fill of no news.
I have had my fill of being unique, unusual, weird, strange, and all the other descriptives that come my way.
I am over being told "I have no idea", "there is nothing I can do", "I've never seen that".

I am over new diagnoses.
I am over no diagnoses 
I am over new symptoms.
I am over the word 'idiopathic', the fall back for doctors who have given up.

I am over a diary filled with nothing but doctors appointments.

I am tired.

I need a break.

But....

I will call the radiology office.
I will make the appointment.
I will call my GP.
And, I will make that appointment.
And I will take my medicine.

Because...

Just in case.
You never know.
Maybe this time.
What if?

And then apathy wins.
But I wont.

(find out more here)

*Update: It can be hard to maintain the medical momentum when you are chronically ill.  But sometimes you just have to suck it up and do it. So I made the call, and am now booked in to be scanned.  

10 comments:

  1. I read a lot of unknowns here. That's a whole other can of worms, on top of feeling terrible.

    Does the unknowns make you lose faith in doctors? Do they scare you?

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  2. i could shout this from the rooftops. Apathy gets the better of me a LOT of times. Sometimes the only thing that holds me together is knowing i have the power to say "No more doctors this month," because if i have to be sick i like to pretend i have some modicum of dignity or control left. And because sometimes hearing the same broken record makes being sick so much more hurtful. Because it is sometimes more healing to pay for a latte than a copay or shot-in-the-dark new prescription.

    Good for you. i need a bit of this determination myself, lately.

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  3. Just what every lady likes, lots of strangers prodding the boobular region. Sigh. I had just ONE small lump last year and every human in the universe squeezed my lady lumps at some point it seemed. Then ultra sounds and mammograms and snore... I had myself convinced it was everything from a giant cancerous ball to a gestating alien. Nope. Just a regular harmless cyst. Phew! But the boob squeezing. STOP THAT! Good luck with your appointment! Go in and tell them you are hereby the Minister of Boobs.

    (don't do that)

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  4. Ashley - I think it's a whole slew of emotions, thought processes. I have periods of wanting something concrete for a change, even a prognosis would be nice. I think many docs aren't interested in the complex case, so you get the too hard basket. But now it's about medical fatigue. Since 2006, all I've really done is play the medical game and it gets tiring after a while. There's lots of talk about carer fatigue, but not a lot about sick fatigue (another post in the works). You play the game for the most part, but then some days you just can't face another blood test, another scan, another new doc appointment.

    Buffy Darling - oh hell yes, latte or shot in the dark new prescription. Latte wins in so so many ways. Control isn't something we have much of so sometimes you take it where you can, even if it is something negative in the long term like not doing a scan, making an appointment. sad but true.

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  5. Veg - oh man dude, so sorry you went through that. I know the first time I had an emergency biopsy (ie doc looked at scans, looked at me, picked up phone to scan woman and said we're coming down now) I shat myself. So glad yours was a cyst and not a giant cancerous ball or gestating alien. Do I get a groovy sash to go with my new title?

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  6. hi michelle

    i understand appointment fatigue, when your hit with several a month, urgh.

    im glad you picked up the phone and dialled. get them checked out. i wonder if its Pots thing, i have many cysts, one i cant think of the technical word, errupted so i had to go and have it checked out. all was fine.

    take care. xxx

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  7. I think the "I don't knows" and the "There's nothing wrong with yous" might even be worse than the actual diagnoses. At least then you have some validation for feeling shitty.

    I seem to like validation. And Valium. But that's another story.

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  8. Em - wow an exploding cyst had to hurt like hell, I've never had that. I am glad it was okay if that can be okay. You'd think one crap health thing would be enough but we seem to keep collecting. I was told if you have endo (which I do/did) you often have cysts and fibroadenomas. And if you have Dys Endo is common, so it seems all related somehow. Just more joy to contend with. After over an hour of scanning I now have to wait till the end of the week for results. Fun fun fun, it just never ends.

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  9. Elly - Valium, validation. I'll take a bit of either. Hmmm all these V's I'm starting to think you may have something else V related on your mind in coming days. Followed by something involving the letters M F B and T. :)

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  10. I am on a repeat script for valium, my doctor trusts me...... also now on slow release morphine plus other stuff. Slow release morphine begins with Z for Zomorph. So perhaps those of us with conditions which don't fit the norm and appointment fatigue get the end of the alphabet for medications.

    I know you didn't want to but you did and I know now that you have you don't want to go, but you will. When you have been and gone even though you didn't want to we will be here. Well I will anyway, because afterall getting out of the house these days is an achievement in itself. You are far better than I am because I haven't even had a specialist for a long time. They just give me more bad news and say its all incurable. So me and my GP just talk on the phone nowadays as I can't even be bothered to go there either.

    Daughter is having stomach 'issues' right now and I hope that its not for always as the more I read of EDS and stomach problems the more there are. So we just have ridiculous conversations about the state of ourselves that probably no one else would understand. Some days OH will walk into a room then straight back out again, as he hears the near hysterical laughter that happens when one lives with a rare condition, with lots, of idiopathic diagnoses.

    Proud of you for making 'that' appointment. Totally get this post. Wish you didn't have to go through all of this and the rest and the rest and the rest.......
    xoxoxoxoxoxo

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