Health updates ... and snow.

Thanks, Steve for the re-invite ... as much as I am online I'm not very good about getting around this website very easily!
So, I was meaning to post, but kept getting here and not knowing what to write. I was told by my mom that I was requested to post an update on my health, so here we go. :)
Ever since I went to Houston, the first thing they told me after the ultrasound was done was it didn't look like it was urgent to perform surgery on me and they suspected some of it could be scar tissue. I made sure I got a surgeon's opinion as well and he assured me that this wasn't life threatening and it would be alright to "wait and see" so if it did get bigger, they could do something. Well, my endocrinologist back here in Lincoln informed me that they may have not had one of the previous ultrasound reports that was done in March of '06 and showed no scar tissue, even after three surgeries. So she believes the lymph nodes that are in my neck right now are cancerous, because some of them also have cysts. The good thing is they haven't grown too much in size, but have changed sizes a bit, like morphing into different shapes little by little. But she too, as well as a very reputable doctor in Omaha, still think that it needs to get bigger in order to have a successful surgery and not three. (That way they know they can get it all at once). Hopefully.
I am told I can get a second opinion because it never hurts, but I trust my doctor and I just have to hope that it stays in my neck and doesn't spread anywhere else. I recently studied up on thyroid disease and the most common types (which I'm supposedly experiencing) are very slow and passive. However, it was not passive at all when I was first diagnosed because it came back twice in the matter of a two-week time span ... so I'm thinking it is a combination of two types called Papilary and Follicular. I am diagnosed with Papilary, but after reading what I did, it seems like it could be a combination of both? I'm no doctor. I am just trying to figure out why it would multiply so fast.
With that, I also found out that some cells that grow in areas they are not native to, like abnormal cells, and can actually act like the cells in that region (a weird cell can pop up in your thyroid and start producing hormones just like the thyroid, but is not a true thyroid cell). Or, if you get one of those abnormal cells and it doesn't know what to do, you could say it's just dumb, it will reproduce twice as fast as a cell that's being productive. It's kind of opposite from people ... if you are a couch potato you're probably not going to get anything productive done, but these "couch potato" cells just feed off of eachother and reproduce like crazy because they don't know how to produce any sort of hormone or do whatever they want to immitate. I think this is what happened in my case. What a coincidence ;)

Okay didn't mean for this to sound like a science lesson, I am in the stage where I'm trying to figure out why it did what it did because I don't even know why I have it. I might have a few explanations for that too, but there are lots of factors.

I'm scheduled for an ultrasound next week, Wednesday the 7th. Then on the 30th I go for a follow-up with Dr. Bell (endocrinologist). I wondered why there was such a gap in these appointments, but I think I figured it out (because they didn't tell me) ... it took her a long time to communicate with the doctor in Omaha so I believe she wants to go over it with him before talking to me so we can setup a game plan if I have to be having surgery soon. Which I will have to eventually, but we just keep waiting to see when.
I will let you know what happens! Thanks for reading and all your concern.

Love,
Annie

p.s. Oh yeah, and we got quite a blizzard early this morning. No work today :) Yay!