The World According to Carl

I am scheduled to undergo a surgerical procedure called a total thyroidectomy on Friday morning. A surgeon will be removing my entire thyroid due to some cold nodules growing when they aren’t supposed to. I’m already taking thyroid medication and will have to for the rest of my life. The only difference is that my dosage will increase. Also, this surgery has now become so routine that it’s now on an outpatient basis. So if things go smoothly I should be home sometime late in the afternoon or sometime early evening. If my calcium levels don’t balance out right away, they will keep me overnight but that’s about it. My surgeon recommends taking a full week off but that’s mainly because he will prescribe me a narcotic painkiller to use post surgery for the week. But that is dependent on my pain threshold. If I feel like I need it, he wants me to use it, but if I can get by using Tylenol, that’s okay, too. I don’t have to use the narcotic painkiller. And frankly, I plan on using it as little as possible. I’ve always had a fairly high pain tolerance and I think that by the time I am scheduled to go back to work on Monday, I probably will be able to get by on just regular OTC Tylenol. I do have a history of using narcotic pain meds for a much shorter time than expected. For example, when I had all my wisdom teeth out (two simply pulled — two requiring a dental chisel) I took a narcotic painkiller once when I got home and did fine without it afterwards. When I had gastic bypass surgery, I was prescribed a strong narcotic painkiller but by the time I got home after three days recuperating in the hospital, I didn’t use any of it. Even after surgery, I only used the morphine pump once and that was when I rolled over onto an incision while I was asleep. Talk about being awake instantly! However, I have talked it over with my supervisor and he assures me that it will be fine to take off as much time as I need. However the way my brain is programmed, I feel an obligation to be at work whenever possible. Even some of my co-workers think I’m a bit daft for wanting to come into work ASAP. Oh well, that’s just the way I am. My Momma and Daddy didn’t raise no slacker. I figure that maybe, just maybe, I’ll need that Monday off, but since I’l have more than two-and-a-half days to recuperate, I also figure that it’s highly likely that I won’t need the painkillers and can go to work Monday afternoon for my normal shift.

Now for the issue that does concern me. Actually, more than just a concern but a full-blown, freakout type of phobia. I have always had a phobia of needles (i.e. — belonephobia). The kind they stick you with for bloodwork, vaccinations, IVs, etc. I’ve never been able to get rid of this phobia on my own and I haven’t found anyone who can help me be rid of it. This is why I am actually writing this early Tuesday morning. I probably won’t be able to write anything the night before because I’ll be severely jittery and having all sort of anxiety attacks.

There is a good news aspect to this however. Last summer, I had to have a thyroid biopsy done. I told my doctor about my phobia and after hearing what I would have to endure during this procedure, I told him with absolutely NO uncertainty that I most likely would not be able to hold still and would be freaking out severely. After explaining to him that my phobia was HUGE, he prescribed a medical “cocktail” in pill form to start taking about 2 hours before the procedure. I did and went to the location, taking those pills all the way up to about 15 minutes before they did it. Although it made me a bit lightheaded, I really didn’t feel all that different. I couldn’t walk very straight (glad my wife was driving) but I was still scared. However when it came time to have it done, I still white knuckled the sides of the gurney, but…

The anxiety was gone. No freakin’ freakout. I was just, “Okay, get it over with.” Yeah, it stung a little and was really sore afterwards, but it’s never been a pain thing. Just something psychological that I’ve never been able to shake on my own and probably never will. It ticks me off at myself because I haven’t a clue as to why I am this way about this. My Momma has a similar phobia of needles but I’m willing to bet mine’s worse. So I don’t know if it’s somehow a genetic disposition or it rubbed off on me. Sort of a nature versus nurture thing.

The doctor that prescibed the medical “cocktail” is going to be the surgeon on this and he has prescribed the same stuff again. Now the analytical side of my brain tells me, “It’s going to work swimmingly well again” while the emotional side of my brain is going, “YAAAAH! It ain’t gonna work! It ain’t gonna work!” And I know the closer the time comes for the surgery the louder that emotional side is going to become. All this just to get the stupid IV in. But with God’s help, I’ll get through this as well. I will have to have bloodwork done post-surgery but he indicated that they will be able to give me something through the IV to help me with my phobic feelings when that time arrives. I want him to reassure me of that when I go to the pre-op consult the day before the surgery. There are chances for various complications, some of which are quite frightening, but the odds of them occurring are well less than 1% and the worse the possible complication the lower the odds. Plus, this surgeon has done this operation for 15 years and according to his nurse, he hadn’t had any complications with his patients. I pray to God I ain’t the first.

Therefore, if this blog goes on hiatus for a couple of days, you now know that it will be because I’m too doped up on painkillers to type straight. But hopefully and prayerfully, I will be back on this blog very, very soon. Most likely with an update on my condition and thoughts about the surgery. I just ask you to keep me in your prayers and thoughts.

Wednesday evening addendum: My anxiety attacks are now getting worse already. I fear I’m gonna be a complete nervous wreck come Friday morning.

I got back home at about 5pm Friday evening and slept quite a bit. Right now I’m up and writing this update but will log back off and take some pain meds and conk back out. This is sort of a good-news, bad-news, good-news situations. The good news, of course, is that I got through the surgery in fine shape and they sent me home. The bad news is that they also found a grapefruit-sized growth they didn’t initially detect hiding behind my collarbone and removed that, too. The good news on that, at least I hope it’s good news, is that the possibility that it is cancerous is very small. It’s being biopsied and the results should be back in 3-5 working days. I am praying for the best and I would appreciate your prayers and thoughts, too.

Trackposted to Rosemary’s Thoughts, Allie is Wired, Faultline USA, The Random Yak, Political Byline, Pirate’s Cove, The Pink Flamingo, Leaning Straight Up, CORSARI D’ITALIA, Democrat=Socialist, L.O.M.A., and Conservative Cat. Also, thanks to Linkfest Haven Deluxe.

This entry was posted on Friday, November 21st, 2008 at 8:00 am and is filed under General, LinkFests. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.