Sunday, July 11, 2010

My arm is fine (mostly)

Well, I learned a new word yesterday: enchondroma.
This is a kind of tumor when part of your bone turns back into cartilidge. Apparently, bones start out this way in the first place. So, unless this thing becomes cancerous (only some of them do) or much larger (I'm in that "not quite a problem but almost" zone), we won't be doing anything but monitoring it. No surgery, no chemo (phew! I don't have to lose my hair again!).

I will, however be getting one more test just to try and get a little more info: a radioactive isotope test. Yes, they're shooting radioactive dye into my veins. Then I have to wait 3 hours while it works its way through my system and then i lie around for 45 minutes while they scan me. I'm pretty good at lying around, having had much experience, but I'll keep practicing just to be sure. One more adventure in health care. And I get to hang out at Sloan Kettering in New York City, the creme de la creme of hospitals. Even the robes are nice. And the doctor was great. I'm telling you, I'm never going back to my old cruddy system of just grabbing the first guy out of the phone book. If you must go to a doctor- and if you have a chronic illness, you must- wow, referrals are so important.

Meanwhile we haven't figured out what's causing the pain in my arm, as it may not be the enchondroma but possibly one of my various autoimmune conditions. We're complicated creatures, we autoimmuners, and we can be very tricky to treat. If it's not the enchondroma, then perhaps it's the chronic inflammation. Just guessing.

'Til next blog post,
Be well, all. and thanks for all the well wishes.