When This You See Remember Me

We said goodbye to Molly on August 17, 2009. I still don’t have words for the giant hole in my heart.

After more than a year of fighting the congestive heart failure her kidneys failed. She was bright and loving us until the end. Euthanizing her was among the most difficult things we’ve ever done as a family. Lab values showed that she had no kidney function at all and her blood was full of toxins. Her last day alive was a misery of vomiting and diarrhea. I spent her last night on earth sleeping on the floor next to her so she wouldn't be alone.

But that’s not how I want to remember her… I want to remember her like this:

Molly was not a lap dog. But if you wanted to pet her... she was there to be petted. In fact, at times she demanded it. She would jump up next to you on the couch, reach out her paw and grab at your hand until you started petting her. We tried to break her of that habit and never did, we were somewhat successful at getting her to be more gentle about it... but she knew exactly what she was doing. Of course she wasn't above shoving her whole head under your hand.

She loved the sun and the wind and digging. But, more than anything, she loved people. And I love her like a sister, and miss her every day. I think we all do... even Merlin.

Well it's about damn time...

So… yeah. It’s, um, nearly a year later, and *waves* Hi invisible friends... Thanks for still, um, being invisible and stuff, because I suck so much and have been missing for so long. It took a random stranger coming by and posting a comment asking if I was dead to get me to write to you. Sorry. But you deserve so much more than sorry… so here’s the best I can offer, an update with some pictures.

Pathetic sweater progress and also unfolded laundry. Yay me.

You see, first there was the surgery thing. That was January 27th. It sucked in all the ways that surgery should suck, and was not awesome enough because I was hoping to feel a lot better by now. They did find a tumor, on the outside of my pituitary gland. So they scraped it all off… the operative report describes it as being a “particularly pale soft cheese-like substance”. Not something you really want in your head anyway. Cheese. Ew.

So the pathology report confirms that it was a tumor. But it stained for a hormone that I never had an excess of. Not at all helpful to me in the long run, but why should it start being helpful now? The doctors tell me that these cells are often dual-producers and that prolactin (what it stained positive for) often goes with ACTH.

Since the surgery I’ve seen some improvements, but a lot of my old “symptoms” are coming back… including the fatigue. Without the miracle of long acting amphetamines I would never get anything done. Honest. And at times the crazy really takes me over. I try to keep it chained to a tree in the backyard, but I swear it’s got bolt cutters hidden out there somewhere.

Also, I’ve also discovered The Bloggess. Reading her blog and pretending that my life has moments equally as awesome as hers has been a lot easier than writing my own blog, and possibly more interesting. Thing is that since I’m not a crazy stalker, mostly, and she already IS her I should try come up with my own thing. Only I’m totally stealing the cussing. Because saying THE FUCK?! Often just really suits me right now.

Like for example: The last time my testosterone levels were checked they were only 6 points above qualifying for an NIH funded study about being deficient. However, my endocrinologist says this is okay because I’m not Middle Eastern. THE FUCK?!

I mean, I can’t say this TO HIM. But I hope I can tell you about it? In fact… I think I’m about ready to tell you all about how my current endocrinologist is driving me to want to drink. Only I’m too broke right now to afford anything GOOD to drink. So I’m sober. Which sucks even more. Someone send me a good bottle of wine.

In the meantime my secondary markers for growth hormone are getting lower all the time. They’re so low that they are appropriate for an 80 year-old but not this nearly 38 year-old. But my great endo doesn’t want to send me for a growth hormone stimulation test. Why? I don’t know. He just said “You don’t want to do that.” THE FUCK?! Uh, I think I’d rather do that than have another brain surgery!

Because that’s where things stand… in the absence of more changes maybe we do another surgery. And possibly cut out the entire right side of my pituitary gland. Which I think I’m currently using.

So, I’m writing my endo a “love letter” telling him how much I need him to stop wearing his ass as a hat and spend my insurance money! TEST ME DOOD BECAUSE I FEEL LIKE CRAP. Only I said it much nicer-like. And I didn’t write THE FUCK?! Not even once.

I’ll let you know what happens.

This is getting a little long so I’ll stop and save a thought to share with you later… midnight blood draws.