Since the cancer has spread, the best treatment option is to treat this aggressively. As a result, I will have a total thyroidectomy and removal of many of the lymph nodes in my neck. The day we are scheduled for surgery is June 7th (the save the date picture is kind of a joke, because I think I'm funny). It's about a 6-hour surgery, and will require an overnight stay at the hospital. I'll have to deal with staples and two drain tubes in my neck (ew) for several days, but overall recovery shouldn't be too bad given everything goes as planned -- so let's cross our fingers. I'll have a pretty good looking scar, but that's the least of my worries. If you want to get an idea of how my scar will look post-surgery, click here.

RADIOACTIVE IODINE

My doctor highly recommends I do a dose of Radioactive Iodine to kill any remaining thyroid cancer throughout my body after surgery. Because I am nursing, I won't be able to do this until farther down the road.  I can continue to nurse little Indie until she is 6 or 12 months, and then we'd do the Radioactive Iodine 3 months after I've stopped nursing. Once we're to the point where we're ready to do this, depending on the dose, I'll have to be in some form of isolation to prevent exposing others to radiation for some time. I'm not looking forward to this, but you gotta do what you gotta do.

HOW LIFE IS GOING TO CHANGE

I don't really expect life to be all that different post-op. I'll have to be on medication for the rest of my life, but once the dose is perfected I should feel normal. I plan to adjust my eating a bit to be more friendly to my thyroid-less life, but really, life shouldn't be all too different.

HOW I'M FEELING

I'm feeling okay! Not great, but not bad. It's all a bit overwhelming, and I know they say this is the "good kind of cancer to get" but at the same time, is any cancer good? Overall, I'm still a happy person with an extra dose of stress. I had hoped the last several weeks of my maternity leave from work would be spent savoring every second I could with our little babe. Which, they will be in a way, just there may be some slight limitations. This is probably what I'm struggling most with, but I know that everything will be okay! It's better to sacrifice this time now to take care of myself, rather than worry about it later.