If you know one of us, you know that we are not just crazy about cancer ribbon. This one is our favorite, the one that makes us smile and laugh so hard that we forget to breathe.
The one that made us laugh this week, the one that made us cry. It’s the one that made us think about how much we really love the holidays. It’s the one that made us want to go back and see that special face of the girl who sang “Oh, Susannah” over the holidays. It’s the one that made us want to stop using the “I’m getting cancer” bracelets that we bought so we could continue to wear them even after we had cancer.
We can’t believe we’ll actually be able to say this, but we’re taking a break from the current issue of our magazine and instead are doing a tribute to the victims of thyroid cancer. It’s not just our own lives that we’re mourning, we’re mourning a world that we can never see. We can’t possibly imagine the suffering and heartache of a woman who has cancer, or what it’s like to be sick for so long.
The disease itself is terrible, and many people find that they can’t live without the medication or treatments that doctors give them. But the most awful part is that cancer is actually a genetic condition. When a person has a mutation in their thyroid, they can have cancer at any time. They just don’t know it. They may not know they have cancer until it’s too late. All the while, they’ve kept their life as normal as possible.
The thyroid is the body’s “master gland” that keeps the body in balance. It’s the first thing to go if there are any problems with your thyroid. It also has a lot of functions that are essential to maintaining your health. So cancerous cells can’t grow, and the thyroid is the only organ that can.
So if you have abnormal thyroid activity that is not under the control of your doctor, then it can be hard to find a thyroid specialist that can help you. It can be extremely hard to get a diagnosis, especially if you’ve never had a thyroid problem. Even if you’ve had them, they may not know they have cancerous cells in the thyroid. There are many different types of thyroid tumors and they can all respond differently, so knowing which tumor is causing the problem is important.
It’s called a thyroid cancer ribbon. The reason for this is that people with thyroid cancer have their thyroid glands removed to treat the cancer. It may be a minor surgery, but the good news is that the process is relatively painless. The doctor will take out a tiny piece of tissue from your thyroid gland and then surgically remove it. The doctor may also do a biopsy to check for cancer cells.
Cancer surgery may be a little more involved than simply removing a piece of tissue from your thyroid gland, but it’s still less invasive than a thyroidectomy.
So what’s the procedure like? Well, I had a “threesome” with friends last night. I was the patient and one of the other guests was the surgeon. The doctor was a pretty nice guy, but it was pretty uncomfortable. It was the first time he had ever removed a thyroid gland. We had a nice conversation over dinner about the type of removal he’d do and the different ways to handle it.