Thyroids and Toes

Yesterday, I observed at my endocrinologist's office. My doc wasn't there that day, but two other docs let me come in and see some thyroid biopsies. They use a large needle guided by the ultrasound, and insert it into suspect thyroid nodules to obtain tissue cells. They numb the area with Lidocaine only. Yikes! I was excited to see something new, but after a couple, I was done. Plus, one of the docs I really did not like. I thought he was inconsiderate to the patients and employees. The two patients that this doctor did biopsies on, complained of pain during the procedure, while the first doc (the one I liked) did not. The first doc was gentle, explained things to the patient as he went along and was quite thorough. The other doc hardly explained anything to the patients, and was quite rough on them. He was also very rushed and had one of those anal retentive personalities. Ugh.

All in all, I did not like that office. I was bored out of my gourd, sitting at a back desk reading magazines, waiting to go see something. They even forgot about me one time, so I missed a procedure. I don't know, it's hard to describe, but it just wasn't what I would call a quality setting to work. I may be ruined by my awesome experience at the imaging center, but at least I know what I'm looking for. When I went to lunch, I decided I was going to leave, so I said that my toe was bothering me (I'll tell you about my toe in a sec) and get the heck outa there.

My toe.

If you don't like to look at feet, especially an ugly toe, don't look at this picture:





Man I need a pedicure. Anyway, on Thursday, I was at the YMCA doing my PE class. I was trying to kill a few minutes at the end of class, and I went over to the calf-raise equipment. There was a girl using it, and there were too many weights on it, so I offered to help take a weight off. It's a big round thing with a hole in the middle, so it hangs on a peg. I pulled it off and thought I was "tossing" it to the floor, but somehow caught my toe. All 45 pounds of it. I said "ow," and thought it would be OK. Then, it really started to hurt - BAD. All I could think about was getting to a private place to work through the pain. So I went around a corner and sat in a chair, and scrunched up in a ball to wait for it to go away. It didn't. I think the pressure was building underneath my nail! Then, of course, my teacher found out, and they had to do an accident report. I found myself with three people hovering over me (remember I just wanted to be by myself!). Finally, they went away. I didn't cry, mind you, until I got home and the pain STILL wouldn't go away. I put ice on it, elevated it and everything. I called the nurse at my doc's office, but it took a couple of hours for her to get back to me. Meanwhile, I cried and tried to squeeze my other toes. I turned on the TV to distract me, but it would just overwhelm me at times. Then, after a couple of hours, it started to subside. The nurse called, and I wanted to know if I should have them drill a hole in my nail to relieve the pressure, but she thought, if the pain was subsiding, it would be OK.

Today is Saturday, and I can still feel my heartbeat in my toe, but it's not too painful. If I keep it elevated, it helps.

That's my toe story.

Aren't you glad you read it?