I wanna get better
Sep. 17th, 2017 09:52 pmIt's not like there are a lot of people waiting for updates, I realize, but I'm sorry it's been a while since I posted any news. I have bursts of energy and I still get drained really easily, or else I have weird pain that makes it hard to be in certain positions, or things like that. I've probably pushed a little too hard, too, on doing things just because I live alone and things must be done and there's just me to do them, but sometimes that leaves me completely sapped.
I've hit a depression valley, too. I don't know if it's similar to the post-surgery depression a lot of people get, and that I got after my gallbladder surgery, but that was also because I'd had a forced withdrawal from antidepressants at the time, I think I remember. This one feels a lot worse, and now the Republicans are trying to take health care away again, which is fueling my anxiety. I fucking told everyone they wouldn't let it lie, every time people were acting like it was a triumph last time I got really angry because I knew they wouldn't let go, and here we fucking are.
The other thing that's fueling it is that I'm having a hard time with this idea of being a cancer survivor--I mentioned to![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
killabeez that I was watching something and a person described herself as being a two-time cancer survivor and it hit me that that was what I am now. My experience with cancer has largely been that no one survives, not for long anyway. I have a few friends who have, but by and large the people I know don't survive, and it's very strange to think of myself as someone who has had a cancer and now has to think ahead about staying a survivor. (And of course, this is the mother of all preexisting conditions now, so if that goes away, I'm basically fucked.) I find this trippy and depressing and frightening.
Most people I'd talked to (not the doctors, but most other people) made it sound like it was cut-and-done: you had the surgery and they took out the section with the tumor and that was it. But it's not that simple, as I found out in my two-week followup on Tuesday--I see her again in a month and then they'll want to do six-month tests for a while, as they want to make sure no tumor cells are floating around, waiting to attach to the colon again and grow. So there's the year follow-up colonoscopy, and the six-months blood work tests, and check-ups as well. I can get an oncologist, or I can follow up with the surgeon; I'm inclined to stay with her since I know her and I like her. the big problem will be insurance, as my insurance company is leaving the ACA exchange and the only other semi-decent one in the network wasn't working with my clinic last year, which is why I ended up with the insurance I had this year. They're all crooks, but I have to find the crook that will cover things with the clinic where my doctor and my surgeon practice, which seems impossible right now.
Otherwise I'm slowly recovering--today was rough, I'm having really sharp pains in my lower abdomen when I move a certain way, and I took off the steristrips on the smaller incisions which on one was a mistake, because now I have a huge gaping wound there that's way too big. The steristrip was really gross, though, because it was seeping, but I traded one problem for another.
I had a lot of trouble in the hospital with bleeding and stuff like that, I won't gross you out by telling you about some of the more alarming things, but one of the incisions bled a lot and kept staining my gowns, which I could not get them to acknowledge for a couple days. It left me with this incredible gross huge scab, but the surgeon just peeled the steristrip and the scab right off on Tuesday and wow let me tell you that hurt! So I thought, well, I can woman up and take the others off…ha ha ha. Bad move.
Anyhow, right now that's where I am--just trying to get better, trying not to let the post-apocalyptic atmosphere I came home to (with the city choking on smoke and the heat that's finally, finally broken today) depress me even more, and just trying to keep going in the face of everything.
I've hit a depression valley, too. I don't know if it's similar to the post-surgery depression a lot of people get, and that I got after my gallbladder surgery, but that was also because I'd had a forced withdrawal from antidepressants at the time, I think I remember. This one feels a lot worse, and now the Republicans are trying to take health care away again, which is fueling my anxiety. I fucking told everyone they wouldn't let it lie, every time people were acting like it was a triumph last time I got really angry because I knew they wouldn't let go, and here we fucking are.
The other thing that's fueling it is that I'm having a hard time with this idea of being a cancer survivor--I mentioned to
killabeez that I was watching something and a person described herself as being a two-time cancer survivor and it hit me that that was what I am now. My experience with cancer has largely been that no one survives, not for long anyway. I have a few friends who have, but by and large the people I know don't survive, and it's very strange to think of myself as someone who has had a cancer and now has to think ahead about staying a survivor. (And of course, this is the mother of all preexisting conditions now, so if that goes away, I'm basically fucked.) I find this trippy and depressing and frightening.Most people I'd talked to (not the doctors, but most other people) made it sound like it was cut-and-done: you had the surgery and they took out the section with the tumor and that was it. But it's not that simple, as I found out in my two-week followup on Tuesday--I see her again in a month and then they'll want to do six-month tests for a while, as they want to make sure no tumor cells are floating around, waiting to attach to the colon again and grow. So there's the year follow-up colonoscopy, and the six-months blood work tests, and check-ups as well. I can get an oncologist, or I can follow up with the surgeon; I'm inclined to stay with her since I know her and I like her. the big problem will be insurance, as my insurance company is leaving the ACA exchange and the only other semi-decent one in the network wasn't working with my clinic last year, which is why I ended up with the insurance I had this year. They're all crooks, but I have to find the crook that will cover things with the clinic where my doctor and my surgeon practice, which seems impossible right now.
Otherwise I'm slowly recovering--today was rough, I'm having really sharp pains in my lower abdomen when I move a certain way, and I took off the steristrips on the smaller incisions which on one was a mistake, because now I have a huge gaping wound there that's way too big. The steristrip was really gross, though, because it was seeping, but I traded one problem for another.
I had a lot of trouble in the hospital with bleeding and stuff like that, I won't gross you out by telling you about some of the more alarming things, but one of the incisions bled a lot and kept staining my gowns, which I could not get them to acknowledge for a couple days. It left me with this incredible gross huge scab, but the surgeon just peeled the steristrip and the scab right off on Tuesday and wow let me tell you that hurt! So I thought, well, I can woman up and take the others off…ha ha ha. Bad move.
Anyhow, right now that's where I am--just trying to get better, trying not to let the post-apocalyptic atmosphere I came home to (with the city choking on smoke and the heat that's finally, finally broken today) depress me even more, and just trying to keep going in the face of everything.
