Low Iodine Diet: The Sequel

It's official. I've got my Thyrogen. I've been on the Low Iodine Diet (LID) for the passed week. In some ways, I feel like I've gone back in time as I prepare for my scan this week. A few months ago, I cried in the nurse's office as she told me the details of my scan-- the number of appointments, the Thyrogen injections, the bloodtests, and then finally the scanning dose of radiation. That was the last straw. Radiation, again. It was a strange thing for me to realize that I had to enter the world of thyroid cancer again. Especially since I felt like I left my status of cancer patient behind. But there I was crying in the nurse's office and when I dried my tears, I began to cry again.

"Why am I crying?" I wondered. It didn't make sense. "Why can't I stop?" I barely cried when I was diagnosed two years ago. I didn't cry at my surgery. I didn't cry when I was in complete isolation for for four days. Why was I crying now? Logically speaking, doing the scan and preparing for it wasn't any worse than anything I had been through already. I won't need to go into complete radioactive isolation for four days. I decided to do my scan in September. After the wedding. After I had gone back to work. After I had some time to prepare for it... mentally... I can do this. Last Sunday, I drove to four different health and natural food stores looking for salt-free foods. Iodine free salt is not sold in Canada is what someone told me. I ended up using the Windsor Salt from the last time I was on the LID a year ago. I realized this week that I can do this. I just can't wait to get past it. So in the meantime, I am enjoying a largely whole foods like beans and rice minus the salt. I can do this. I can get drug benefit coverage reimbursement for the $ 1594 I spent on the Thyrogen.

I will go to the appointments that I need to. Another woman going who was diagnosed with thyroid cancer, told me that this scan is part of the follow-up. The protocol. When I asked Endo #3 if I had to do a scan, he said no. That put it completely out of my head. No more radiation. No more hospital. No more LID. Lies. But then Endo #4, my new endo, told me I needed to do this. Disappointment. Betrayed? Tears. I will get past this. I am sleepy but a different kind of tired. At least I don't have to come off my Synthroid for two weeks. At least I don't need to be in withdrawal from synthetic thyroid hormone. I will get past this. The scan is a much lower dose of radiation to see that the cancer cells are gone. I will need to be away from children for 3-5 days. I will need to sleep in a separate bed from my husband for about that long.

I wonder will that mean I don't need to think about cancer after the scan this Friday. Maybe... maybe not. I hadn't thought about it for a while even as the editor for the Thyroid Cancer Canada newsletter. When I go to the gym to workout, I have stopped thinking about the fact that I "beat the odds" or are defying the cancer that attacked my body. Cancer had started fading into my memory as something in my past. I want cancer to stay there.

On the LID Tip

This is my fifth day on the Low Iodine Diet. And my second blog with a TLC reference. (T-Boz Left-Eye and Chili.) I'm sleepy and tired and became a vegan for Lent before doing my Low Iodine Diet. So technically, I'm low iodine vegan diet. I thought my selections would be quite limited but I'm surviving and feeling quite full. I've been juicing like crazy. Smoothies each morning. Homemade bread and stew. Today I made a lovely multi-lentil dhal with quinoa. (Quinoa is both a carb and a protein. This is key since I can't eat tofu or soy anything, both sources of protein and calcium.) I feel okay but mostly tired all the time. I tried to nap earlier but couldn't. So I tried to read first which usually puts me to sleep, except I was reading "Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal" by Eric Schlosser so of course I could not sleep. I read through the chapters on why the fries taste so good, slaughterhouses, cheap and illegal immigrant labour, severe workplace injuries and deaths, poor working conditions, and began to read about pathogens in the meat. Enough to make me say Grrrrrr. And I guess enough to keep me awake and not napping.

I think that this cancer experience is changing me. Today and yesterday I became more mindful, thinking about the here and now. Something I don't typically do. Usually I'm lamenting the past or obsessing over and planning the future. In fact, I had to delete my first blog entry which I wrote in 2008. It was so personal and painful to read. I was really stressing out about multiple issues and it seemed so raw, so angst-ridden.

So I think my first lesson, my most important one is to take things slowly and one at a time (both new concepts to me.) Slow and one step at a time. Meditation helps me to breathe and to focus and to take things one... breath... at... a... time.