2006 October « inquisitive geek with fibroid tumors ™ blog

UPDATE: My condition three months post-Uterine Fibroid Embolization

October 30, 2006 — EclecticGeek

I postponed this update until after my period so you would get the most up-to-date information. Looked over my 2-month update before writing this and just realized that I lost track of a period. I vaguely remember having one at the beginning of the month but really didn’t write much about in my composition notebook. I had several other things going on at the time. Incredible how my periods now are in the background. I attended a dinner with my husband on Saturday and thoroughly enjoyed myself (can’t beat that good food + great company combo). It’s incredible that I don’t have to rearrange my life anymore. My periods and these dang fibroids are no longer a major focus. Wow.

Details of my most recent period:

Friday, October 27, 2006: Cramping and spotting starting that morning. Bleeding became heavier as the day progressed but still not that much more than spotting. Ended up taking a total of four 200mg over-the-counter Motrin during the whole day. (This was exactly the same as my last update.)

Saturday, October 28, 2006: Cramps were more painful (still moderate) and the bleeding slightly heavier. I would characterize the bleeding as light to moderate. This was a five 200mg Motrin day. I took the extra Motrin so I could enjoy the food (and company) at the dinner.

Sunday, October 29, 2006: Light cramps and light bleeding (slightly more than spotting). No Motrin.

Monday, October 30, 2006: No cramping but light spotting most of the day.

I am feeling well. Haven’t noticed very much of the weird calf/ankle/foot swelling on my right side but, then again, I haven’t been working out very much. Yes, I’ve been a bad geek. I really need to get back on track with my exercising. Want to start talking about fibroids and weight gain and subsequent weight loss. It’s coming. I promise.

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Posted in Body, Experiences, Fibroids, Health, Mind, Minimally or Non-Invasive, Personal, Recovery, Spirit, Treatment, Uterine Fibroid Embolization, Women's Health. 6 Comments »

How are you feeling after your Laparoscopic Hysterectomy?

October 27, 2006 — EclecticGeek

One of the visitors here is having her surgery very soon. I’m hoping this post will generate a good response so we all can learn more about this procedure and the recovery. (Click the link to view the whole comment.)

Bonnie: …I am having a total laproscopic hysterectomy on Monday (October 30th) …I can’t find much information about the surgery online, mostly abdominal or vaginal assisted ones.

Best wishes Bonnie.

For more information:
Uterine Fibroids Guide for Hysterectomy (Mayo Clinic)
Laparoscopic Supracervical Hysterectomy (OR-Live video)

If you have a laparoscopic hysterectomy experience, question, concern, or thought – please post your comment here.

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Posted in Body, Complication, Experiences, Fibroids, Health, Hysterectomy, Life, Medicine, Personal, Post-Op, Questions, Recovery, Surgery, Treatment, Women's Health. 316 Comments »

Is anyone having fertility issues because of uterine fibroid tumors?

October 26, 2006 — EclecticGeek

After seeing some discussion on this site about uterine fibroids and fertility, I wanted to create a separate thread. Viewed a PBS program Monday on the history of IVF research in the United States so this post is quite timely. I’ll post a few links you can visit for more information and then open the discussion.

From MayoClinic.com:

Fibroids usually don’t interfere with conception and pregnancy, but they can occasionally affect fertility. They may distort or block your fallopian tubes, or interfere with the passage of sperm from your cervix to your fallopian tubes.

For more information:
Hysterosalpingography (Wikipedia)
Fertility Tests (Mayo Clinic)
In vitro fertilization (Jones Institute)
Reproductive Endocrinology (Wikipedia)

Ladies, talk to me about an RE, an HSG, IVF, and any other letters of the alphabet that come to mind. If you have an experience, thoughts, or questions on uterine fibroids and fertility, please post a comment.

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Posted in Body, Complication, Experiences, Family, Fertility, Fibroids, Health, Life, Medicine, Personal, Pregnancy, Questions, Women's Health. 127 Comments »

PBS American Experience – Test Tube Babies (story of IVF research in the US)

October 25, 2006 — EclecticGeek

IVF (test tube baby) Watched another great PBS show a couple of nights ago. I heard about it last week and kept walking around the house, audibly reminding myself to view it. The broadcast was a documentary on the history of in vitro fertilization (IVF) research in the United States. I was fascinated by the story behind the technique. At least a couple of my visitors here have mentioned IVF. I’ll write a little about the television program and then get busy creating a post about uterine fibroids and fertility issues.

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Body, Family, Fertility, Fibroids, Health, Life, Medical Decisions, Medicine, Personal, Pregnancy, Science, Women's Health. 3 Comments »

How are you feeling after your Endometrial Ablation?

October 24, 2006 — EclecticGeek

Second post based on the great comment left describing a personal experience with endometrial ablation and laparoscopic myomectomy. Since I added the full comment in the previous post, I’ll just include an excerpt here:

Mary: I just had a laparoscopic myomectomy and hysteroscopy/endometrial ablation two days ago.

Pre-surgical issues and diagnosis: I had a huge, slow growing external fibroid that was about 9 * 10 cm at its peak, plus several smaller internal fibroids that were the cause of my long, heavy, painful periods. My gynecologist referred me to a surgeon who is head of Ob-Gyn at a local hospital and teaches at a major Canadian medical school. (Very relaxed guy, easy to talk to, and well-respected.) He checked me out and declared that the internal fibroids could be taken care of with hysteroscopy and ea.

You know I must leave the obligatory links for more information:

Endometrial Ablation (The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists)
Endometrial Ablation (Mayo Clinic)
Endometrial Ablation (OBGYN.net)
Endometrial Ablation (WebMD)

If you have an experience, questions, or thoughts on endometrial ablation, leave a comment.

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Posted in Body, Complication, Experiences, Fibroids, Health, Post-Op, Questions, Recovery, Surgery, Treatment, Women's Health. 339 Comments »

How are you feeling after your Laparoscopic Myomectomy?

October 24, 2006 — EclecticGeek

A contributor here left a detailed comment on her experience with laparoscopic myomectomy and hysteroscopy/endometrial ablation so I’ll create two separate posts to start the discussion.

Mary: I just had a laparoscopic myomectomy and hysteroscopy/endometrial ablation two days ago.

Pre-surgical issues and diagnosis: I had a huge, slow growing external fibroid that was about 9 * 10 cm at its peak, plus several smaller internal fibroids that were the cause of my long, heavy, painful periods. My gynecologist referred me to a surgeon who is head of Ob-Gyn at a local hospital and teaches at a major Canadian medical school. (Very relaxed guy, easy to talk to, and well-respected.) He checked me out and declared that the internal fibroids could be taken care of with hysteroscopy and ea. He’s done over a hundred of these procedures and is probably the go-to guy in my city for this procedure. He also said that it looked as if the external fibroid was on a stalk and could be at risk of twisting, although he also said I wasn’t showing any of the signs of being at risk — no feeling of movement — so it was up to me whether I wanted to just leave that one alone or remove it as well. I decided to go for the laparoscopy because of the twisting risk (my sister went through the horror of an ovary getting twisted and i didn’t want to go through anything similar) and because it would be nice not to look five months pregnant.

Surgery: It was supposed to be about 2 hours, but turned into three as it turned out the external fibroid wasn’t on a stalk, but was embedded in the external wall. I asked my doctor after surgery about the risk of adhesions given that such a relatively large surface had been excavated, but he says that I should be all right.

Recovery: I was in the recovery room for an hour after surgery, then moved to my hospital room, where I was told I was staying overnight just to be cautious, given the extended work required for the external fibroid (we had originally discussed the option of going home the same day). The nurses had me up and peeing within a couple of hours. The first time out of bed was a doozie, and my bladder was tight, sore, reluctant and overfull the first time, so I didn’t get rid of two cups of urine until my second attempt. After that, I was up and down several more times throughout the day, alternately reading, napping, chatting with my husband, or having my vitals checked. By 8 PM, I was adept at getting myself out of bed on my own, unplugging the IV from the wall, and going off to have a pee. (They dumped a few liters of saline in me, so I was peeing like a racehorse all day.) By 11 PM, I got out of bed and wandered the halls with my IV because I was bored and wanted to move. The pre-surgical anti-inflammatory suppository took care of most pain except what I felt when I got out of bed and the gas pains in my shoulders.

They let me have jello, broth, juice and a few crackers for supper the first day, and a real breakfast of egg, bun and cream of wheat the next morning. I was discharged by 8:30 and home by 9:30, where I caught up with some clients for a few hours (self-employment isn’t all it’s cracked up to be sometimes) but I was sore by supper time and took off the rest of the day. Gas-X, naproxen and stool softeners were my friends, and even though I have percocet, I haven’t taken any yet. I did take some cough syrup to suppress coughing, which hurt yesterday, although much less today.

First bowel movement was late yesterday (first evening after surgery day), and there was no pain, although reaching to wipe was a little awkward. At my worst, my whole abdomen felt taut, swollen and sorte, with occasional gas pains on top. Today, I got up feeling significantly better, and my belly is less taut and numb.

I’d love to know how long it’s going to take all this swelling to go down. My face and eyes were very swollen the first day, I still couldn’t wear my watch and rings yesterday, although I can today, but my waist and belly are larger than they were than when I went in. (Gas? Fluid? Swollen tissues?) I have no idea how long it will take for those to shrink, as I would think that removing something 4 inches in diameter would make things smaller in circumference.

I’ll report back with anything else of interest.

Thanks Mary. Nothing more I can add except a couple of links for more information:

Laparoscopic Myomectomy (FibroidSecondOpinion.com)
Laparoscopic Myomectomy (Mayo Clinic)

Please post your experiences, thoughts, or questions.

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Posted in Body, Complication, Experiences, Fibroids, Health, Myomectomy, Post-Op, Questions, Recovery, Surgery, Treatment, Women's Health. 438 Comments »

Does anyone have a hysterectomy experience to share?

October 23, 2006 — EclecticGeek

This is a decision that a number of my visitors are facing so I’m looking for hysterectomy experiences. The topic will be broad for now. Once comments are posted, I’ll create new questions when necessary (e.g. post-op recovery for specific surgeries). I’ll include a couple of links with more information and then open the floor.

According to womenshealth.gov (The National Women’s Health Information Center):

A hysterectomy is the second most common surgery among women in the United States. (The most common is cesarean section delivery.) Each year, more than 600,000 are done. One in three women in the United States has had a hysterectomy by age 60.

More hysterectomies are done because of fibroids than any other problem of the uterus.

Sites with more information:

Medline Plus – Hysterectomy (provides links to additional resources)

MayoClinic.com – Uterine Fibroid Decision Guide (includes extent of hysterectomy surgery, what to expect, common concerns, and pros and cons)

The Journal of the American Medical Association Patient Page on Hysterectomy

Uterine Fibroids and Hysterectomy (Thanks for the link fibroid free!)

Surgical Video:

da Vinci® Minimally Invasive Robotic Hysterectomy

Laparoscopic Supracervical Hysterectomy

Please leave a comment if you have a hysterectomy experience to share (does not have to be fibroid-related) or thoughts, questions, or concerns.

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Posted in Body, Experiences, Family, Fibroids, Health, Hysterectomy, Life, Medicine, Mind, Personal, Post-Op, Questions, Spirit, Surgery, Treatment, Women's Health. 134 Comments »

Changed the theme. Tell me what you think.

October 21, 2006 — EclecticGeek

I decided to change the look of the site. Been thinking about it recently but finally took the plunge because of a browser issue. This is a problem on my laptop so I will extrapolate that it’s a browser issue on at least one other computer in the world.

I normally use Firefox because… it is the best browser ever! The added features are great and you just can’t beat the tabs. I have 12 windows up right at this moment. Flipping back and forth between multiple sites is the only way to surf. Anyway, the old theme looked great in Firefox 1.5. Decided to pull it up in AOL and Internet Explorer 6.0. Wow. It looked kind of crappy.

Perhaps Ye Olde IBM (that’s my laptop’s nickname) is having personal issues. On the off chance that isn’t the case, I changed the site theme to one that looks decent in Firefox, IE, and AOL. I like it. The only possible problem is the small font (letter) size of the comments.

If you are having trouble reading the comments or anything else on this site, try this:

Hold the Ctrl key down and click the + (plus) key at the same time to increase. Use Ctrl and the - (minus) key at the same time to decrease. OR
Find View in the menu at the top of your browser. View -> Text Size -> Increase (Firefox) or Larger/Largest (IE) to increase. View -> Text Size -> Decrease (Firefox) or Smaller/Smallest (IE) to decrease.

If these instructions don’t apply to your browser and you still need help viewing the site, list your browser and we’ll work from there to come up with an answer.

Let me know what you think about the site’s new look.

Posted in Blogging, Geek, Life, Personal, Site News. 3 Comments »

What questions should I ask my fibroid doctor?

October 20, 2006 — EclecticGeek

Continuing my series on fibroid doctors with this final post. I am fortunate to have many contributors here who add helpful comments. A good one on questions to ask a uterine fibroid doctor was left by fibroid free. I’ve edited them slightly to apply to all surgeries or procedures.

ask doctors questions

What is your background or specialty (e.g. OB/GYN, GYN surgeon, Reproductive Endocrinologist, Fertility specialist, Interventional Radiologist)?
How long have you been performing this surgery or procedure?
How many have you performed?
How many have turned into a hysterectomy? (This, of course, if you have not chosen hysterectomy.)
What is the risk that you will need to do another type of procedure once the surgery starts?

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Body, Doctors, Fibroids, Gynecologist, Health, Interventional Radiologist, Life, Medical Decisions, Medicine, Mind, Personal, Pre-Op, Questions, Spirit, Treatment, Women's Health. 6 Comments »

How do I evaluate or rate a fibroid doctor?

October 19, 2006 — EclecticGeek

This is the second post in a series on fibroid doctors. Once you find a doctor, it is vital to feel comfortable with that professional. Medical knowledge is important but never underestimate good communication skills. Medicine is both a science and an art. Make sure your doctor practices both.

PBS is airing Remaking American Medicine. I am impressed by the amount of information there including this great list on evaluating a doctor: Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Body, Doctors, Experiences, Fibroids, Gynecologist, Health, Interventional Radiologist, Life, Medical Decisions, Medicine, Mind, Personal, Pre-Op, Questions, Spirit, Treatment, Women's Health. 9 Comments »

How do I find a good local fibroid doctor?

October 18, 2006 — EclecticGeek

This is the first in a series of separate posts on fibroid doctors. Finding a good local medical professional is key to getting the best fibroid care you can. I’m the first to admit that locating a doctor can be difficult. Hopefully, this will assist in that process.

Read the rest of this entry »