It's Not a Tumor!

C'mon, if you had constant stabbing headaches, cranial pressure, eye flutters and numbness in your hand, you'd think "Aw shit. Maybe it's a tumor." Right? Or maybe I'm just a little bit of a hypochondriac. Because according to my doctor, it is, in fact, not a tumor. And yes, he did say it just like Arnie, proving that there are in fact medical professionals with a sense of humor. Apparently the stabbing headaches are indicitive of stress, which is the same thing my I was told about the stabbing pain in my right breast last summer. Not a tumor, stress. Which is weird, because I don't generally feel stressed. I mean, sure, day to day minor stress, but not big time pain inducing stressed. I really should get back in to yoga or something.

Anywhooo.... after determining that it was not a tumor, my doctor decided to investigate the tingly numbness thing. Blood test showed that I am low in B-12, so to determine if I am not getting enough in my diet or am not absorbing it (something to do with not producing intrinsic factor) my Doc ordered a Shilling's test. All I was told is that it involves taking a radioactive B-12 pill and a urine test. Now in my experience any test that involves radioactive tracers takes as while, as the tracer has to work it's way through your system, so it can be traced. Not wanting to miss more work than necessary, I called the Nuclear Medicine unit at Royal Jubilee Hospital to inquire as to the lengh of the test. 15 minutes I was told, which surprised me, as I figured it was a "Take this pill and pee in this cup after 3 hours" sort of a deal.

So I get to the hospital at 8:45 am, am given a B-12 shot and the pill, and handed what looked like an orange 3 litre gas can and a nuns hat. Ummmm....excuse me? Apparently whoever answered the phone when I called didn't think the fact this test involved a 24 hour urine collection to be relevant information. The little nuns hat was a plastic insert to put over the toilet to pee into, which was then to be transfered in to my gas tank thingy. Yeah, that was a fun call to make to my new job, "sorry, can't come in, I'm harvesting piss today." I mean seriously, it's sort of a take the day off work kind of thing. No one wants to see me sloshing about with a tank of pee.

I owe Ruth a huge thank you for driving me back to the hospital the next dau so that I wouldn't have to suffer the indignity of taking my 2305 ml of pee in the not so subtle container (my name and 25 hour urine collection we sharpied on the side) on the bus.

I've had a wicked nasty cold for the past few days and, despite my Granny's trying to convince me to go to the doctor, I am holding out. I think the whole pee thing was God's way of telling me to chill out on the health woes.