Goiter Girl

This story starts senior year of high school. I was a pretty busy person who was involved in lots of things. I always thought this was the reason I was tired. I would come home from school, plop on the couch turn on the TV to watch cartoons (Spiderman and Recess) and within 10 minutes I would fall asleep.

I couldn't help it. I was exhausted. Then night came and I had a hard time getting to sleep so I would, again, plop on the couch and watch movies--always a cartoon, usually disney. I would actually rotate through certain sleep inducing movies like Land Before Time, Lion King, and Mulan. On an unrelated note, I think the Land Before Time is actually an allegory of our life here on Earth as journey to heaven.

(think about it: a spirit guides the way through many obstacles for
them to reach a place they can be together with their families. I think
Don Bluth ripped this story off the plan of salvation. He was LDS, you know.)

My family would make fun of me, not just for watching so many cartoons, but for being so lazy and sleepy all the time. Then, the summer after graduation my Dad noticed something. "What's wrong with your throat?" "huh? Nothing's wrong with it," and I stormed out of the room to see what he was talking about. My throat looked like it was swollen. I ignored it for a few days, but then I realized what it was:a goiter. I had learned about goiters in my biology class. They are caused by abnormal growth of the thyroid. I didn't want to post a real picture of a goiter because they can be ugly, ugly things. Google it if you're curious.

So I diagnosed myself with help from the internet and determined I had Hypothyroidism. I went to the doctor and confirmed my suspicion. It is fairly common in women so if you have many of these symptoms, you should get a blood test.

• Poor muscle tone (muscle hypotonia)
• Fatigue
• Cold intolerance, increased sensitivity to cold
• Depression
• Muscle cramps and joint pain
• Goiter
• Thin, brittle fingernails
• Thin, brittle hair
• Paleness
• excessive sweating
• Dry, itchy skin
• Weight gain and water retention.
• Bradycardia (low heart rate: less than sixty beats per minute)
• Constipation

At first they put my on a high dose of thyroid hormone replacement. That kept me pretty wired at night during the first few months of my freshman year of college. I had serious insomnia. Finally they got the dose right and I've been fine ever since and my goiter went away for the most part. Throughout my pregnancy, my levels were normal. So my doctor told me to get it checked after I had Parker. I thought to myself, "I feel fine. It has never changed before. I'll do it later." So I never got it done. That backfired on me. I've been pretty tired lately. I even have to admit something horrible. I'm ashamed of it, but last weekend was pretty crazy and I didn't get very much sleep. Sunday came along, and I was too tired to wake up, get Parker ready all by myself, prepare my lesson and get to church on time at 9:00. That's right. I sluffed church.
I've never done that. I was just so tired and I wasn't thinking straight. Matt was gone to meetings, so I just slept in as long as I could. Fortunately Parker was tired too. I felt so bad. Then the next day I was looking in the mirror and noticed something. My goiter was back. It was smaller than the original goiter, but everything fell into place. My thyroid levels were off. I went to the doctor as soon as I could to get my blood test and the results were as I suspected. So my medication will be adjusted and hopefully I get back to normal. Moral of the story: listen to your doctor and you won't get a goiter.

Now I'm in the mood to watch some spider-man cartoons.