I met with the head at Baptist…He was wonderful and actually felt that although he could do the surgery that RAI is a good option as well and since I am an actor and my voice and my neck are kind of part of my career ( more my voice) then he actually said that the RAI is a valid option. When asked what he would tell his wife he couldn’t even commit… I felt like he was being honest and once i told him I have Hashimotos he was like well the good thyroid side is eventually going to have issues so …you will need to me on medicine at some point- whichever way you go.
After our meeting steve and I were walking out of the office and looking for his car we lost in the garage…we both had a gut feeling that the RAI pill is the way to go. I felt the risk of the surgery is too much -( scar-downtime-vocal chords- plus I had two last in the past two years and I feel like . filled my dance card- why push a surgery if I don’t need it) ) and that the precision is maybe not needed. If some of the nodule is left is that a bad things? still on the fence…
I am going to one more FINAL FINAL surgeon tomorrow and I will see if he says anything different than…”they are both good options”…just which one do I want WANT to do..I don’t want a surgery…but I also DON’T want to be HYPO but I will be bc I have Hashimotos and I will have to accept that one day.
I am also going back to my nutritionist to see about my result and what her thoughts on all this is….SOOOOO many opinions…have to allow myself to sift through them…a surgery now is better than one later…
Saw my nutritionist and she pointed out as did my DR. friend that when a surgeon says that RAI is also a fine option then that is something to consider. Usually surgeons only talk baotu surgery but this older wiser well versed Dr. was like… you have options and the nutritionist felt a non surgical approach is a good idea…
I met with the second Surgeon at UM. He was very pro surgery and was not at all interested in RAI. He felt it was not a good choice and that the risk of RAI are too great. There are recent studies that have found complications..He also did a sonogram and we saw that my right nodule is indeed swiss cheese or as he called it Hash…why are doctors so freaking funny at times like these. nLNAO
I left thinking if I had surgery he would be the guy but in the end…after all of this back and forth I had chosen to do the RAI in a week and being the healing process today.
I am not at all excited about surgery and have heard recently some bad stories so my heart isn’t in it… just from general surgery being done around town….that being said my mom, myself and others have never had issues…the only one who had an issue was my father who only did radiation and this makes me worried but FUCK THAT
I have booked the date to do the RAI and that is that and from there I will begin to have to take my medicine my ego is splitting again. I never realized how much I loved saying I wasn’t on any medications and now…now I will most likely have to say that i take….but hey there is that one chance that I will be fine and good and swell…but I am not dreaming i am envisioning a butterfly a happy healthy butterfly and that is why I texted MICA to see if I can have my butterfly dress back as a tribute…
I plan to stay at my moms and hold up there sleeping and juicing and recovering…I hope to be up and ready to go for rehearsal on that sunday..
We shall see.
I am getting my head around this… Steve agrees with me. He tends to be right…rational…at at times like this it is a good thing to have by my side..
SIDE NOTE
Steve may look at an office space in my building…cute..
I was so excited to met with Dr. Dach. I learned about him online and was told by my holistic friend he was amazing…and very much seems to take a holistic functional approach to wellness after 25 years of working in traditional medicine.
His office is in Davie and my mother and I drove up for my appointment. I wanted to spent time with her so we went up early and ended up eating at a place that was called Mustard seed in Davie. I had actually by chance ben there before and It was super yummy.
we were a little late for our appointment but Dr. Dach was not at all bothered. We sat in his office and we spoke and he was funny and sweet and asked some questions and then asked me to tell my story. I told him the whole journey.
When he was about to tell me his thoughts I reached in to my folder and pulled up an image of the iodine upscan. He said I had not sent that and so I gave it to him.
He looked it over and then he continued and said. Yes, I agree with Dr. Thaler. You need to either have surgery or Iodine Radiation. Also he asked about the IODINE in take and then once he calculated the amount he advised me to stop. ” it is putting flame on the fire. You have an autonomous nodule and it is running rouge and iodine is feeding that.” Shocked again. The reason I was going to Dr. Dach was because he was listed as one of the few iodine practitioners in the south Florida area and here is is telling me to stop taking it. I was just …I was…all of it..his agreeing with Dr. Thaler and now the stopping of my lovely IODINE. NOOOOOOOOOO
I was stunned. My functional Dr. was agreeing with my mainstream Endo.
I looked at my mom.
” but what about the Hashimotos?” I asked him.
Dr. Dach is an older gentleman and kind. His response was non verbal at first. He held up the image and pointed to the discreptency between the two sides of my thyroid. One side was BLACK which i believe represented it being very HOT and the other was partially normal.
“This is your concern at the moment, do you see the difference in the sides?
I go the message loud and clear. he was not flippant of cold he was not even matter of fact he was actually LOVING…which I needed…rare to find that.
All in all Dr. Dash spent nearly an hour with me and sent me on my way without even charging me for the consultation. I was impressed with all of it. He had such a sense about him and you could tell he is here to truly heal people.
I walked to the car with my mom who immediately mentioned I need to send him a thank you letter. I got into the car and mad an appointment with my Dr. Thaler my endo for the following day.
When I go home I researched the two options and found a local expected thyroid surgeon is at Baptist. Dr. Udelsman.
The next day I spoke with Dr. Thaler about my two options Iodine Radiation or surgery. oh (and I mentioned i was back on Iodine drops and he said well after you have this all taken care of maybe we will put you back on it. ) YEAH
I left the appointment and called to make two more appointments. One with the Surgeon I found online which is also the Lead Physician of Endocrine Neoplasia at Baptist and also with Dr. Lew at UM who Thaler referred.
This will be something I probably decide to do after the show closes in April or May.
Proud of myself for following my gut and learning everything about my health…not everything but a lot…about the thyroid and the hormones and my genes and really cutting out the gluten and Diary and Coffee and sugar.
i have decided to cast a team of people to help me through this maze of a thryoid/auto imune Story. And it is just that, a sotry I am going THROUGH I will one day tell someone about in two sentences.
I had Hashimotos and now I don’t- excuse me while I go out for my second curtain call.
If anyone can focus in on casting people it is me after all the breakups I have had with friends and creatives over the years.
First I am truly understanding that i enjoy several people telling me the same thing. It gives me less wiggle room and I tend to wiggel.
So, the latest and greatest addition to my team at Dr. Kogon who originally informed me I have Hashimotos and out me on supplement that helped me feel better ( i believe) I have fired my Edno who I won’t name .
My holistic Gyno is Dr. Wolloch who I adore and my nutritionist is Andrea Larson and I will be meeting with Dr. Dach who will be the supporting actor of this piece. I am the lead. 🙂 I have already decided that without meeting him because he is an iodine practitioner and also used to be an MD and now is in functional medicine. I have read his studies, Seen him referenced in books and I have heard great things from people who heard of him…so Monday I will meet him and I hope he will look over all my tests and as I read up on the protocol for Hashimoto’s I hope he will be my “stage manager”
i look forward to NOT writing about this so much but to be honest taking . are of yourself is a full time job and requires diligence …what you eat, think, feel and do…mindfulness on a day to day basis……
So it is about 3 months since I started actively getting info on my swollen neck that I never noticed and it turns out that.
The chiropractic neurologist diagnosed me correctly, as did the Endocrinologist at first ( from the sonogram) and then finally a blood work that easily shows I have anitbodies for hoshimotos…
so…soo….I also DO NOT have any genetic mutations so that is a HUGE relief…but
my sloppy diet is no more.. I am now a care taker again…of myself…I am back on a journey that will one day have no clear start date as it will feel like me.
i feel better off OFF all these things ( diary, caffeine, eggs, wheat) . I feel better and that is what my focus is and my kids and family.
I did call into my original DR office that eventually misdiagnosed me and he has no concern I am LOW in iodine and reiterated it even though the test results say so. People live in their own world unless they dare to break free…and live in none of them..which is scary and unstructured my joyful and wild- structure is much more manageable.
IF you are interested in helping another person be it from a place of grace and love and not from bitter jealousy.
But who is to know…if it is. Only those that dare to pull out their thoughts and read them like those of a fortune cookie …to hear the lines that were written many years ago and to acknowledge they are still in the sub talk..underneath what you wish you fully felt..but no thought is fullly one shade it exists because of its opposite- what matters is what we allow to grow.
WHY? Because the dark thoughts are within us always…it is only through patience and acceptance of them that we can learn their use…a power source we can transmute into high voltage grace..if we can hold are hand there long enough without slapping it away or into another- 30 seconds then a minute…and so on until a whole hour can go by long enough for you to get distracted and move on to something more pleasant…without loosing space and time in the dark void of your light…
Look at the thought from all angels and see it…for what it is …a thought that is requesting a ticket to your emotions and a healed person has removed the monthly pass and knowing it can not evict the thought..has decided to attend to it like any other rider…with grace – patience and understanding..
WHY.
Why do I think that horrible thought…walk the cat backwards as my acting couch would say and see where this might have all begon and pull the root out a little..a little more…each time and soon it will be a thought without a root..a bad actor who doesn’t land her lines…she just mouths them and they have no power on her or any other who she thought this about. but the thoughts may remain just not rooted…and that is fine..
Thoughts…are more powerful than actions or words…they are your everything…learn to dance with them..play them good music…entertain them in doses but never ignore them. Address them with a smile and love if you can muster it…
i am workin on some things…in my head…my body is tired…could be i am only home 2 weeks…I am coming off a huge endeavor…could be I have a little health issue with my thyroid…could be i need iodine or don’t need it…could be a lot of things…but
I am taking iodine drops as of this evening and all of a sudden I felt the need to go work out in the pool…after being very tired today…and falling asleep while I was reading. So the question is..what helped me today…the cat nap or the iodine drops.
this is going to be something I am going to talk about because I have just now had a thyroid issue to speak of…but I am seeing a few people about it
it is something that is built daily and with each decision we make. If you have attained it, it must be maintained. CON-fidence is about moving past yourself often in small ways that matter to your soul.
small ways that perhaps only you can see and those small ways build a being that eventually people see and say..wow, you’ve changed. Hopefully for the better if you were making conscious choices.
I have disappeared…I have become another version of myself…and “she” “old me” sneaks in when she catches the eye of a piece of candy that seems to get her innards moving and she can’t help but bite her lip and tease in her mysterious little way because old me can’t die she can just be told to sit in the corner mostly and that is fine…because now when she comes out it is like an old flame…I can flirt with but nothing is going to happen with…because it is so over..done…been there…
I have touched upon confidence and each day it grows stronger till it doesn’t and I slip down a shoots and ladder slide and look up trying to remember the steps back up. CONfidence is gained and maintained and lost and found and in that…in that ..we can play the game well- in a day flip from one to another and back again…dexterity is the key… light easy going surrounded by lovers of your key…
PS. PS. After continuing on the journey and learning more about IODINE I will soon learn that taking IODINE with an AUTONOMOUS NODULE like I have is A NO GO and I have to get off it until I handle the nodule issue: here is the blog about that info
I am putting this here so that incase you are not reading the entire blog you dont miss this very important info,
my Endo…not mine anymore we broke up. I am trying NOT to send him I told you so letter…But I feel so vindicated…so empowered….but I shall blog here about it instead.
OK, So if you read the other blog about how this Doc and I didn’t click I want to tell you I stayed with him anyway. He was fine enough and was able to order tests and we did them ALL.
The last one was a Thyroid uptake. To be cleared to take that I had to take an IODINE LEVEL test. Make sure I was not HIGH in Iodine. ( remember my interest in being too low he dismissed?)
REMEMBER. I was taking iodine originally when I went there from what I learned on the internet and this DOC was so annoyed with my "flippancy to take something SOOO dangerous"...he demanded I get off it to run the labs and wait 8 weeks ( along with other bovine supplements which perhaps he was correct about since I am still reading HYPER)
Anywho….the iodine test was then taken. I was happy to gather my pee in a container all day if it meant I would get that original question I asked answered…could I be iodine deficient?
almost a week later I was rollerblading when the doctor called..He had also taken a blood test the last visit and so I had a few questions answered.
NO graves antibodies and my iodine was fine…
FINE
Really?
I was shocked but I believed him.
days go by I did my iodine uptake test and got those results back today.
At the time he called …I was in the isle of a healthy grocery story googlings over sweet potato rice noodles and holding a juice I got for my post circus out I had just finished. and my doc recomended that since I have a toxic Nodule and hyper I should consider radiation therapy.( something he spoke about on day one office visit and seemed a fan) I asked about the outcomes of success..he said 50/50. Meaning I could just as easily be healed as I could become HYPO after all of this.- He then mentioned surgery could also be an option. I asked for a name of a second opinion and also asked if I have time to think on this. He said YES and then gave me the name of a DR.
I thanked him and said something like an apology for my crazy crying fit my first appointment with him and I had not expected to ever go back but to see him after that but I did -I didn’t follow my gut..my usual way of running from such a flip-ant person when it comes to not . open to listening …and going toward a kinder alternative more open approach…( part fo that is still true because if you keep your eyes open…no matter which way you go you will learn what you need to)
I called steve gave him the news as I looked at the sweet potato pasta…I don’t remember what he said other than…Steve felt that the he recalled the dr. very into the radio active and that we will see the other doctor and talk about surgery..
I hung up and then thought…oh I have been lining up a naturopath gyno…I am going to see her bc she was recommended from three friends and when I filled out her intake questionnaire a few weeks ago -I fell in love. She wanted to KNOW KNOW me and yes it is out of pocket…but my pocket had money in it and what better way then on my health. I called and asked for their first available …they said today at 4pm WHAT? OMG
I paid for my juice and that pasta made from sweet potatoes and I called the other endo as I walked to get my eyebrows threaded..I like this strip mall ..but they don’t have a pole..I digress…then I stayed on hold with the other ENDO office while my brows were cleaned up and I made an appointment on the 4th…of December moments before my online coaching session will Jill Grunewald of the book about Thyroid and food. I cover my bases when I do this type fo stuff…like a character I find our everything…research is my second name or at least investigation and following my gut.
I went to my SPACE got my labs form my past appointments and organized my papers…( i have a book in here i need to write..found the outline and everything ) I went home and printed out the latest labs I showered got the Jaedon from school..I stopped by my internal general dr and picked up my OLD labs ( that proved this was an issue a year ago and NO one mentioned anything- Cleaning house) and I was soon enough on my way to my GYNO naturopath appointment.
I get there and at first there was a mix up but eventually It was cleared..I could see the DR. I went in..I could see her standing at her desk through the reflection in the glass door she has. PROPER..
I sat down we talked…she went over ALL the labs and all the info in the original new patient questionnaire I LOVED so much-we spoke about a few different things…she wanted me to see a surgeon about the thyroid…UNTIL…
and here is where that red circle comes in- we went to do a pelvic exam and she said I have a LARGE fibroid…and will need an ultrasound. OH i say…yes and she goes on to softly state how this may need to be removed of I will need a hysterectomy if it is too big or gets bigger..OH…and then she talks about BRACA and all that and I say well one thing at a time..and then she says well everyting is connected and I say how and the conversation leads slowly to IODINE and how being low can cause these things..I tell her I had a test and it was normal and she said oh,,let’s go look at that and here is the kicker.
The Iodine test was taken with the intention on insuring I was at a low enough level to have additional iodine given to me at the uptake radioactive iodine test… devil is in the details.
But when I looked at the LAB report TODAY – the GYNO and I we saw that the red circle said ACCEPTABLE FOR TYROID scan…but JUST ABOVE THAT..
details.
It clearly states I am LOW in iodine.which can cause a toxic nodule and thyroid issues and so…I have an answer to WHY…why the thyroid and why the fibroid.. and the heavy persiod and the lists of things..
THANK GOODNESS for that patient portal that had my documents and for me being diligent and following MY GUT again and making that appointment Today and for knowing who my follow ups were and my team and for my friends I have made that gave me all these names and people they trust…tomorrow. I have another appointment with a nutritionist who I can say..hey. I have low iodine…lets fix THAT.shall we…
I feel vindicated from writing this… I see now from trying to explain the story to you why my doctor miss read the lab results – The red circle was around something he wanted to see – he wasn’t looking at what I wanted to see and so..be your own advocate…as my dear DARIA would say.
I can hear my father..always ask that next question..I hear him saying …nice research… and I got an image of him holding hands with God I asked him about BRACA and he said nope….i am spared…so he thinks…but that is for another day. Maybe tomorrow…can’t a middle age lady breath a second.
Took my iodine felt amazing….didn’t sleep I was too wired from all of this new information…
PS. After continuing on the journey and learning more about IODINE I will soon learn that taking IODINE with an AUTONOMOUS NODULE like I have is A NO GO and I have to get off it until I handle the nodule issue
Jewbana my love…we have spent a year together ..if you think about it.
a whole year…And we even went to Europe together and it was amazing and you were amazing… you ARE amazing…and when we came home I showed you to my city to people who would really get you and you KILLED it it was amazing… and I am so proud of us…all of us…
I am concerned though…to be honest …in how to maintain our relationship…back home with all the distractions and my desire to CHANGE..to evolve to move on..to run away..
I am going to set you down..a moment to breath – to have you relax to see what the universe says to me…I am going to trust that I can approach you from another direction and in order to do that I have to move away a bit.
I see your name on sweat shirts…I see it…I see your name on t-shirts that have quotes from you -I see your name around town- and then MAYBE I see us getting back on stage together…on a screen- on a pole – I wish I had a person to be responsible for…I have a space now as thought that will keep me interested…in you in us…momentum…it is a BITCH…
I know you are amazing..I will POST your story so people can buy you and read you and watch you and wear you..
I just don’t have the energy to produce you right now…at this moment… Once in Sept and once is October…..not bad…my Dear and two calls from the JCC and a call from the Shandrel RIvers theater….but…
I am tired and awaiting a call about how my Thyroid is working with Iodine and I want to tend to MYSELF now and my family. I had to take a radioactive pill for them to see how I use Iodine.. so i need to tend to me a moment…
I adore you..I am so proud of us and all we have accomplished…I just have to give myself a little breathing room..
You have given me a voice and I appreciate that gift.. you also gave me the knowledge that I can do a one woman show and in that I am blessed
(checking email for some reason)
I just got an email from Shandrel Rivers theater about a run there… and yes there are others that want to see you…I am going to chat with them but I am TIRED…not sleepy tired but trying to see what the next goal would be….
I know you land
I know you get audiences..
Should I try and build that up?
Maybe I need to pitch you as a show to Netflix or Disney or amazon..???
Maybe i need to produce the pilot?
You ask a great deal of me…JEWBANA…
but I asked more from you and you delivered so I get it…
I love you.. let’s take some space as these emails come in as I continue to rehearse you at my old High school as I buy sweatshirts for samples of merchandise I see your name on…it is returning……. you are so like me…girl…chillax…and enjoy the two minutes of it…. try.
about 18 years ago or so I maneuvered myself into a pitch for a female contraceptive device called NUVARING with an pharma company named-
I had just heard about it and loved it and wanted to share it with the world. I came up with commercials and called the company every day for weeks until they allowed me to pitch my campaign.
It was good. The tag line was…”This is the ring you have been waiting for”
I remember being in NY and and driving to NJ -staying at my Aunt and Uncles on the upper west side.
But mostly I remember the room of men – the clients- the ad team for Nuva ring-or the pharma…i guess it was the pharma bc I was pitching to THEM…the men who looked at my with interest as I pitched my campaign. I was wearing a blue dress much like Monica Lewinsky…I remember the room of men and the contraceptive and the irony of no women being in the room as I spoke about a birth control device you insert in your vagina…it was odd and to me at the time somewhat normal as an actor…a room of men deciding things . even for my down theres.
And I remembered that experience today while I was standing in a room in front of 20 women- the client- the company – during a fitting for a pharma commercial I am shooting on Sat for something that helps women.
It has been almost two decades and the juxtaposition was digestible …
