It has been six months and one day since I last posted. I am happy to report there are no reports of cancer thus far. Hurray! However, one of the not so great side benefits to having regular, closely spaced appointments with the medical community is that my body's inadequacies are becoming glaringly obvious.
On the one hand, it makes sense. I mean, I'm no Spring chicken, and the body is starting to show signs of wear and tear. On the other hand, why does the juxtaposition between my brain and my body have to be there at all? I mean, I still think I'm fairly youthful though my body is communicating otherwise.
I am four months short of the two year mark and going strong. Thus far the knee MRI's show zero cancer, numerous bone spurs, and zero meniscus - on the anterior and lateral sides. What that means is that there is more surgery in my future - just not the immediate future. Here's the problem: the knee has no padding and it is bone on bone a lot of the time. Pain is pretty much a daily fact. I have a brace, one fitted to my leg, that minutely adjusts my walk so some of the pressure on the lateral side is relieved, and I can walk without pain for a reasonable period of time. When that stops working we will go for synovial fluid injections.
I would get artificial synovial fluid injected straight into the knee twice a year. This would act as the knee lubricant and hopefully provide relief. I'm not all that crazy about this option, and here's why. I'd been walking the stairs at work for a few months when my knee started giving me a lot of pain. It was swollen, and I could hardly bend it. I finally went to the doctor after a month of this. Well, it was fluid on the knee. Too much too soon. Even after 18 months. Had about 60 cc's of fluid sucked out and replaced with steroids. It would have been fine but ooh, boy! I got a bit woozy. I don't handle big needles and seeing what came out of my body all that well. As for the artificial synovial fluid, hopefully it would only be an injection and not fluid removal, too. Regardless, no more stairs for me. Doctor's orders. And that's one order I won't fudge on!
If/When the artificial synovial fluid injections stop working, my only other options are either arthroscopic surgery to clean the knee out or partial knee replacement. So, what I'm working on now is avoiding this option for as long as possible. That includes losing weight and exercise, sans stairs of course.
In the meantime, the chest CT scans identified a multi-nodular goiter. Granted, they run in the family, but just one more thing to keep an eye on. A goiter is a swelling in one or more nodules of the thyroid. Thankfully, blood tests didn't identify any irregularities. So, now I get to go for semi-annual thyroid sonograms and blood tests to keep an eye on the thyroid.
Yup, one more box to check in the checklist of life.
