Which to write about? The awesomeness that was the NaNoWriMo kick-off last night at All Saints or the whole lotta normal that was my test results? Hmmm….
Well, let’s just cover both, shall we?
First off: Test results (because they happened first). Picked them up from Dr.Z’s office yesterday and, mind you I didn’t talk to the doctor yet (my appointment isn’t until the 13th), but the lab lists the allowable limits for each test next to my level and, basically, there was a whole lotta normal going on. Meh. I was really hoping that somewhere in those 24 vials of blood (23 on Monday, 1 on Tuesday) that something would show up. Thyroid checks out and totally normal, so the Hashimoto’s Thyroidism doesn’t seem likely. My Cortisol went from high-normal to the basement after the corticosteroid treatment, which is what a functioning set of adrenal glands do, so Cushing’s Syndrome doesn’t seem very likely either. I looked up the factors for the Metabolic Disease in the NET ‘bible’ and we’d really be skating a thin line to call it that.
The one thing that was elevated beyond the allowable limits was my Serotonin. But not very much (sigh…). when you’ve got a spread of 197 points and your only 14 points over, is that enough to convince them to keep looking? I realize that in order to play by the rules you have to have biochemical findings to support further exploration both to keep from wasting time and money and to reduce the amount of wear and tear on the patient (for instance they don’t want to irradiate me too often if it’s going to keep coming back normal). I get that. But also, on the converse, having a strong theory of what is wrong and yet having to wait until it gets bad enough to show up on the tests doesn’t seem right either. It’s like finding out the foundation of your home is starting to crack… do you go ahead and fix it now or wait until the house caves in and you can undeniably confirm it?
Anyway… I got down to Shand’s on Thursday and, hopefully, they will come up with something. Since I have the test results maybe one of their gurus can look at everything together and pick it out. Maybe it’s like one of my friend’s has said and it’s several small things working against each other, but heaven only knows how we’d figure it out. Plus, on the 9th I go for a consult with the GI, and if nothing else will get the endoscopies done and maybe their cameras will find something to lead us in the right direction. Mom, bless her heart, is really hoping that they never find anything. I know she means well but, really, if they don’t find it they cannot treat it and that’s not exactly helping when we know *something* is wrong!
NEXT!!!
The Kick-Off last night was absolutely stupendous! I knew the RSVPs were rolling in but still I thought it would be manageable until I did a tally yesterday and counted almost 30 positives!!! I hastily sent out an email and updated the post on the forum to show that we would meet on the back porch of All Saint’s Cafe. After getting stalled by a train that just decided to STOP on the tracks (after already being the longest train in creation) when I was but a block away I still managed to get there at 5:30 and some people had already showed (? shown?)–people were already there! But at 6pm we were looking at maybe a dozen. Okay, I’m cool with that. Things came up, no problem. I was feeling a tad better about not being overwhelmed. So I started my talk, introduced myself, and asked for a show of hands of how many newbies we had. All of them (well, except Palmetto, but she was sitting to my side so I wasn’t looking out at her so much). So I start to go over the basics and I hear something behind me:
Apparently, despite the emails and forum posts and the sign I put on the front door of the coffee shop there were several people sitting inside waiting to spot the day-glo yellow shirt I’d said I’d be wearing. (Seriously, y’all, this shirt will burn the retinas!!!) So then, after the word spreads, in comes another dozen plus people: We ended up with 28 WriMo’s OMFG!!!!
Once everyone was signed in and back settled I just had to stop and look around and say ‘wow’. Everyone laughed. In fact, for the most part, I had them all laughing pretty much throughout. (pardon the moment of ‘they like me, they really like me’) The puppets, though, were a very big hit. Of course they were dorky and the Henson family of puppeteers will not be calling upon me any time soon but, no, really, they came off rather well. My attemps at audience participation didn’t quite go over great but, you know, you can’t have everything. Then, per HQ’s request, I plugged the photo links and Flickr site and got everyone (but Palmetto) to pose for a group picture. Will have to get that off the camera tonight after the Halloween party at Julie’s.