Two weeks

I have to get a root canal.

I started having a pretty bad toothache right after surgery and went to the dentist today. I have a cavity inside one of my small molars and it's pretty deep.

Great.

I've never had a root canal before and usually I have a huge fear of the dentist. But having to undergo an emergency surgery helps to put things into perspective. Hey, at least there's no bowel prep for a root canal! I'd choose a root canal any day over a bowel prep, especially when your surgery isn't scheduled until 1:30 p.m. the following day. That is a lot of time to be weak and unbelievably starving and thirsty.

So the dentist put me on antibiotics because it's infected. I'm hoping they make me feel better in general. I've been feeling pretty tired and out of it and just assumed it was due to surgery but maybe it's at least partly because of my tooth. We'll see.

Speaking of my surgery, it was two weeks ago today! I can't believe it's been that long. Two weeks seems like such a long time, but it has gone by so fast. When I think about how long it's been I feel like I should be farther along in my recovery, but then I remember that PPVI says it takes six weeks before you're back to normal. I know it's a slow process.

So I can't remember if I blogged about it or not, but several weeks ago I made an appointment with an RE here in Richmond. It was a doctor who was recommended by another doctor that Fertile Thoughts went to, and she was told that the doctors in this practice would be open to finding a solution other than IVF. At that point (probably a week before I found out about the cyst) I felt like I was spinning my wheels and wanted another opinion (or at least a doctor who could do ultrasound monitoring without me having to drive two hours up and two hours back) so I made an appointment.

I got in pretty quickly, on Sept. 11, but after finding out I needed surgery I kind of forgot about it and when I did think about it I figured I'd cancel it. But now I think I'll just go. The appointment is made so why not just go and see what he has to say? It can't hurt.

After I made the appointment way back, I had to call my doctor's office and ask for all of my records to be sent to me. I chose to have them sent to me, rather than the new doctor, because I figured if I'm paying for them then I want a copy! Now I just have to make copies of them.

So anyways, the packet arrived today. Most of the stuff I can't read, but I did find a few interesting tid bits.

First of all, my pregnancy test from early March, when I got my false positive, says my HCG was "less than 2." My question is, does that mean it was higher than zero? Or could it have been zero and they just consider anything less than two as "less than 2"? You'd think the results would be more specific! I know it doesn't matter, because even if it was 1.25 or something, it still doesn't mean I was pregnant.

Secondly, the pathology results from my surgery were in there. Probably not a good idea to read them before they are interpreted and explained to me by my doctor, but I, of course, still looked. It said it was not malignant (thank you, God! Although I figured if I hadn't heard anything by now they'd be in big trouble if it were something serious!). I know it might sound silly at this point but I was so glad to see that in black and white.

It also said that it was hemorrhagic and had signs of being an endometrioma. And on a separate line it said endometriosis was found. (So does this mean I should start the diet? No! Speaking of diets, I haven't mentioned how bad I've been eating. Let's just say that I'm chalking it up to surgery bloat but it's probably not at this point!)

So the kicker is that I looked at my ultrasound from June, the one that everyone assured me was perfectly normal, and while it did say it was normal, it also said there was something found on my right ovary that could be hemorrhagic and needed to be checked again to see if it was resolving itself (or something like that. I'm paraphrasing here). Can you believe that? That must have been the endometrioma!

Okay, this is why I shouldn't read my own file.

I'm not freaking out or anything, but I just find it really interesting. Of course in hindsight maybe we wouldn't have done the increased dose of Tamoxifen if we thought something was there. Or at least we probably should have done an ultrasound first. Oh well. It's in the past.

So I do have one regret after my surgery - I didn't take a freaking photo of my scar before it was removed!! What was I thinking???? I seriously regret this so much. It would have made for an unbelievable before and after picture. And now I'll never have any proof of just how horrific it was. Oh well. I better not get ahead of myself. This one could end up just as bad. Let's hope not!