A-a-a-hem

About six months ago, I noticed my voice was getting hoarse. No big deal: it was probably a cold. 

I wouldn't say I ignored it; more like I didn't put much thought into what seemed like a normal wintertime annoyance.

The hoarseness didn't go away. It started getting worse. I felt like I needed to clear my throat every few minutes. Part of my job at the time was to produce a podcast, which is how I noticed it: I'd have to stop and cough, or retake a question because my voice had dropped a few seconds in. It was starting to cause problems, in other words.

I felt a bit silly. I was healthy. I do not think healthy people should waste precious health-care resources seeking treatment for imagined ailments or minor issues that will heal on their own. But I started to worry that perhaps I had a problem with my vocal cords. Maybe even -- YIKES -- cancer or something else that was equally horrible. I swallowed my principles -- carefully, as by then it almost felt like I had a lump in my throat -- and booked an appointment with the local nurse practitioner.

The NP thought I might have a thyroid problem, based largely on a mass she could feel in my throat and the fact that I'd lost about ten pounds without warning about a year earlier. (I did not tell her that the weight loss had coincided with some emotional trauma; there are some things I just don't want to get into with people.) She ordered thyroid tests, which were inconclusive.

One piece of advice I will offer for people with an Internet connection is that googling "thyroiditis" is a bad idea. People who have, or believe they have, thyroid problems are an unhappy lot. Those who cannot seem to convince their doctors they have thyroid problems are especially miserable. I wanted to put the computer down and back away slowly. 

And so I was relieved when an ultrasound showed the size of my thyroid was within normal parameters. But I still had a lump in my throat and was having trouble talking. (Yes, go ahead; HA HA.)

The ear, nose, and throat specialist had other ideas. His scope (through the nostril and down down down COUGH COUGH COUGH) showed a polyp beneath my vocal cords, pressing against them and inflamed from causes unknown but likely caused by...uhhhhhh...talking too much. (I heard you the first time: HA HA.)

He prescribed meds for acid reflux, which I still doubt I actually have, but I suppose that is a minor thing. And today I went to the hospital for surgery to poke at this damned polyp. It was a bit of a procession of "you're too small for this medical device" and I hope there is now a note on my chart: USE PEDIATRIC EQUIPMENT. It took three tries to get the IV line in and two tries to intubate me, and they needed to find a smaller blood-pressure cuff. And after all of that, they found they would need different equipment to remove the polyp, so they simply biopsied it. I was displeased when they woke me up and told me this, as I'd been hoping this would be the end of the line and I understood the options to be "remove it" and "biopsy it and then travel to another city for a second surgery to remove it". It sounds like vocal therapy may be a third option, though; I'm hoping this is the case because I have zero desire to have surgery alone in a far-away city. I'll know more in a week or so.