Vasculitis 2: The Revenge

 I feel I can write this now without the fear that I'll be jinxing anything.

But picture the scene:

There's a pandemic on, you haven't really left the house except to buy food, you have an ear infection.

I've been getting these recurring ear infections over the last two years or so, my outer ear would become very painful, swollen and red, I'd go to the doctor, he'd prescribe antibiotics and the infection would go away in a week or so.

I have another infection, but this it's switched from my right ear to my left, bit odd, but I guess that can happen. I call the doctor, he prescribes antibiotics over the phone, I go take them. A week or so later, my ear is no better, I now go see the doctor in person, a blood test is done. Uh oh cheerios, these blood test results don't look so good, better refer you to rheumatology. Oh hey, it's my old rheumatologist and ohhh, oh no, it's not an ear infection at all. My vasculitis is back baby, and is attacking my ears and seemingly my kidneys? Better refer you to the kidney doctors and ENT doctors as well. Whilst you're at it, have a CT scan, okay?

So all of that gubbins to get to where I am today. My vasculitis has relapsed, I'm back on prednisolone which I haaaate with a burning passion. On the plus side, the kidney doctor isn't particularly worried about my kidneys, so that's a plus. ENT doctor doesn't want to see me unless my ears blow up again. Makes sense, there's nothing to look at otherwise.

I had a CT scan to make sure the vasculitis wasn't causing any unseen havoc on my insidey bits, there was a particular concern about my windpipe being affected, but from a vasculitis side of things, my CT scan came back all clear! What a relief!

But I do be having a lump in my right boob.

I wasn't anxious about the vasculitis returning, I've been there, done that, got the scars. I feel well in myself and that's a huge bonus from last time when I spent 4 months in hospital. But for the first few days after hearing about my boob lump and being referred to the breast clinic, I was okay, I told myself it was highly likely to be benign and statistically, I was moderately low risk.

But then, the 3am reading starts. Maybe it's the just the way I handle things, but I read everything I could about breast cancer, completely devouring websites and downloading pdf leaflets in the dead of night, convincing myself more and more that, yes, I definitely had breast cancer because I am just that unlucky. I didn't sleep a lot for about two weeks straight, because I spent all night worrying about it.

I go to the breast clinic, I have an ultrasound and a biopsy is taken there and then. I go home. Truthfully, the worst part of all of this was waiting. I would have happily taken a positive diagnosis if I got said diagnosis much sooner. I don't wish to sound flippant or be dismissive of breast cancer, I know this is a devastating illness that steals so many lives. But I wasn't afraid of treatment, I've been through surgery and pain, none of that would be new to me. I rationalised in my mind, that if, according to Cancer Research UK, 1 in 2 people born in the UK would be diagnosed with cancer, then why not me? I would much rather face breast cancer than have any of my friends or family do so. This isn't some self-sacrificing thing, on the contrary, I am very selfish, I want my friends and family to be okay.

Turns out, it was benign after all and I had just spent all that time and energy worrying about it like a complete dumbass. Oh well, time to put this whole sorry affair behind me. Except, my mum's been called back after a routine mammogram and in my completely rational mind, this was my fault: that 1 in 2 chance, that coin had been flipped, and it wasn't me with breast cancer then it must be my mum. There goes another week of worrying and not sleeping.

After all that, it was a shadow on the boob. Not even a lump. What a drama queen.

I'm a pretty girl, I'm stunning

So where are we now? I still have vasculitis, my ears have yet to fall off and I don't appear to be in any danger of my trachea collapsing and suffocating me any time soon. You win some, you lose some.