Tuesday, December 8, 2009

And the evil witch put a curse on the princess...part 2

Diagnosis process - the tests

On the way home, from the specialist my parents and I didn't say much. I kept reading the notes he gave me over and over again. The next day I went to my GP and gave him the notes. He gave me the evil eye ("so... you still insist that something is wrong with your thyroid?") but he referred me to all the tests that the specialist requested.

A few weeks later I saw the specialist again, with my initial test results. The first diagnosis was decisive: Insulin Resistance, or "pre-diabetes" or "borderline diabetes". In other words.... I was an inch from full blown diabetes.

The thyroid - well that was another matter. The lumps, or nodules as they are called, were quite large and they were solid.... so they were not cysts. The next step was to do a CT scan with radio active dye to see whether they are "hot" (i.e. blood flows through/in them) or "cold" (i.e. no blood flows through/in them).

That test was scheduled to be done ASAP.... I started to worry (why would they hurry, unless they suspected something wrong?).

The scan showed one nodule as hot and the other as cold.... not a happy result. An FNA (Fine Needle Aspiration), a form of biopsy was to be done.

At this point I was already reading all I could about thyroid and thyroid nodules... I wanted to be prepared....what for? I didn't know, nor did I want to think about it....

Sunday, December 6, 2009

Once upon a time...or how it all started Part 1

So I guess this is where we start the journey.
I was never a skinny girl. But I wasn't always obese.

The change started somewhere around the year 2000. I was 24 years old and I started to bloat... and bloat... and grow bigger. I gained weight even when I was watching what I ate and exercising.

I come from a family with less than perfect genes. Diabetes, heart diseases, cancer... so I used to get all my blood work done periodically at least once a year, preferably twice a year, from an early age. This also meant I used to see my GP....a lot. Needless to say that with the bloating came a gradual deterioration of my blood tests results and an increase in my blood pressure.

He's nice, my GP... but he was sure, more than 100% sure in fact, that my blood work is bad and that I am gaining weight because I eat too much and exercise too little.... he even wanted to put me on diet pills (he tried that several times). I refused... I read about those pills and I could feel something was wrong with me... simply wrong.

I tried everything. I tried diets - counting calories, counting points (weight watchers), I went on walks.... nothing worked. I also started getting headaches. Mean nasty headaches. and I was tired, all the time!

My mother kept saying I need to see an endocrinologist. She suspected something is wrong with my thyroid. My GP wouldn't hear of it. He kept thinking i am perfectly ok.... just lazy...

This went on for years. I hurt my back and my right knee in the process (excess weight can do that to you) and I kept gaining weight and I was quite desperate.

Then in August 2005 I decided that enough was enough. I decided to seek a specialist and pay whatever it takes to get tested and diagnosed.

At the time I was working for an Academic Institute and I knew many professors from various fields. I contacted a professor of endocrinology from the faculty of Medicine and I went to see him.

He weighed me, measured my waist circumference, checked my skin tone in some places and asked a whole lot of questions... then he told me to get up and felt my neck.

His next words were ones I never want to hear again in my life: "I feel 2 lumps in your thyroid. We'll have to start with blood work and ultrasounds and take it from there. Oh and I also suspect you are diabetic".

Those words were the beginning of the journey that changed my life....



Saturday, December 5, 2009

So what is this all about?

Welcome to my blog about my own journey through life with Insulin resistance (pre-diabetes) and Hypothyroidism (under active thyroid).

I decided to share my story, because like many others for a long time I suffered from various symptoms that could have been almost anything and it took years (!!) and persistence on my behalf (many times against the better judgement of my GP) to get the correct diagnosis, treatment and counseling.

I am not expert and no doctor but in this crazy world, with its rapid pace and wealth of information, one has to become one's own doctor simply in order to survive.

By no means does anything on this blog constitute medical advice and/or replaces consulting a professional physician.

In this blog I will tell about my own story and experiences and share tips, recipes and information bits that might be useful for many people - diagnosed and undiagnosed alike. The dietary guidelines I follow are easy and logical and even healthy people will benefit from them.