Progress and Set Backs

   This is a photo of the "parting gifts" I came home with after a stay at the hospital in September. Missing from the picture is yet one more bottle of a narcotic pain reliever that I chose not to fill because my body was already overloaded with medications.
   I remember my first follow up appointment with my new PCP. He wasn't impressed with my questions about what I could do to help my body recover in order to reduce or eliminate the need for all of these medications. He looked at my lab results and hospital discharge summary and stated that it didn't matter what I did..... I was going to be on these medications indefinitely.
  Two weeks later I had to return to him due to my IV site becoming infected and extremely painful (the reason for the prescribed narcotic). While there, he looked over an ultrasound report and told me there were some cancer indicators (cue the anxiety attacks) and that I needed to have a biopsy done. After another two weeks and another PCP visit, my lab numbers were showing significant improvement and my biopsy had been cancelled.
  At the end of November I was finally able to see a specialist who did further testing and finally put a name to the craziness that has been going on in my body. Hashimotos Disease on top of Type 2 Diabetes. In the meantime, I have completely changed the when, how, and what goes into my mouth. I am not going to pretend that it has been an easy thing. EVERYTHING had to change.

  I seemed to be making good progress until December 18 when out of nowhere I became light headed and really off balance to the point of falling on my rear in my kitchen. The first thing I did was check my vitals and found everything was normal except an elevated blood pressure. I played it off to working extra hours and pushed onward.....until three days later I almost dropped at my piano while leading worship at church. By that evening, I was laying in the ER with a blood pressure that was as high as 203/118. After hours of tests, IV fluids, and observation, I was sent home with no conclusive explanation. The next day my blood pressure readings were normal again and have remained so without changing any medications.
  Today I had an appointment to see the specialist who offered some knowledge and understanding about what has been going on in my body. For the first time in 4 months my thyroid levels are normal. NORMAL. The medications that my PCP said I would always be on will make my levels too low if I continue to take them, so I am being weaned off of all but 2 of the medications, and one of those is being cut in half......for now.
   I am still at the beginning of this journey. There have been lots of complications and set backs, but for today, I am thanking God for progress and holding on to hope for continued improvement.