Update of bad news, but not suprised
My neurologist, who blew me off twice, finally got around to calling me back on a exercise question because of my medical profile. While answering my question he informed me I have a second syrinx in my Thoracic area...
I wasn't surprised to learn it was a syrinx; this area has been bothering me since March '08 after returning from living abroad. I was in a car accident in the fall of '07 and it’s the best guess as to when I got the cervical syrinx.
I was so angry at not being told sooner by this "professional" , I immediately made an appointment with my doc to get referred to a (civilian) neurosurgeon so I can get a better ideal of my condition.
I also got blown off by my "friend" and fellow co-workers (the company leadership is constantly told that we are a "family" and to look out for your co worker), I didn't even get crocodile tears from my female supervisor, instead I got completely blown of by letting me know she didn’t even review the medical stuff I sent when I was spilling my guts?!? This is when I needed some emotional support of some kind, I wasn’t expecting a hug or to get special treatment, but some validations would have been nice (insert sarcasm here).
Since the mil docs found the syrinx I couldn’t try to hide or ignore my short term plight. I got a battery of medical appointments with a lot of follow-ups & the joy of looking forward to getting a two hour MRI every 6 months for the rest of my life!!!! I was put on a medical profile where I couldn’t get tested on anything except measuring my waist for the a PT test. To no one’s surprise I didn’t pass because my waist was too big, needed to loose another 1.5 inches. Not any help to my emotional health I found out the guys running the physical fitness program for the thought I was trying to get out of re-testing the pt test by timing it so I can go back overseas for a couple of years. One of them also got the notion that because of the time the profile was dated I was trying to avoid a medical eval board (MEB); I was so shocked that they were so judgmental and what they supsected.
Now I’m concerned again about my quality of life for the long term, while I was concerned with the first one, I’m told the second is in a more sensitive area and would cause all sorts of problems if it ever came to getting surgery!
I mentioned before that I might get fired due to my syrinx. I’ve already gone through a MEB a few days ago and awaiting the results which will take a couple of months due to the number of MEB’s in the pipeline. A funny thing happened, as I noted I need to watch my weight because I’m still in the , but i went to pizza hut and got a med thick crust pizza, chocolate dunkers, and bread sticks with diet Pepsi. I later thought this is what the stereotypical woman would do; a guy would have just gotten drunk.
It felt so shitty to be invalidated by almost everyone, even my counselor (seeing the counselor for childhood baggage due to my dad; cause me to shut down for many yrs, also explains why I’m still single) was in rush to get me out of our session today and cutting me off from expressing what I was saying. It might have to do with a mil war exercise that was going on in their unit…or she’s heard all this stuff before. Either way it wasn’t so comforting…
all for now, will take a day at a time after all I’m not in the worst situation, i still have minor pain and numbness, and given the good timing of being in the mil and close to retirement i shouldn't be left standing on a corner w/o anything to fall back on...VA here i come (insert lack of enthusiasm) & hope they can help.
I wasn't surprised to learn it was a syrinx; this area has been bothering me since March '08 after returning from living abroad. I was in a car accident in the fall of '07 and it’s the best guess as to when I got the cervical syrinx.
I was so angry at not being told sooner by this "professional" , I immediately made an appointment with my doc to get referred to a (civilian) neurosurgeon so I can get a better ideal of my condition.
I also got blown off by my "friend" and fellow co-workers (the company leadership is constantly told that we are a "family" and to look out for your co worker), I didn't even get crocodile tears from my female supervisor, instead I got completely blown of by letting me know she didn’t even review the medical stuff I sent when I was spilling my guts?!? This is when I needed some emotional support of some kind, I wasn’t expecting a hug or to get special treatment, but some validations would have been nice (insert sarcasm here).
Since the mil docs found the syrinx I couldn’t try to hide or ignore my short term plight. I got a battery of medical appointments with a lot of follow-ups & the joy of looking forward to getting a two hour MRI every 6 months for the rest of my life!!!! I was put on a medical profile where I couldn’t get tested on anything except measuring my waist for the a PT test. To no one’s surprise I didn’t pass because my waist was too big, needed to loose another 1.5 inches. Not any help to my emotional health I found out the guys running the physical fitness program for the thought I was trying to get out of re-testing the pt test by timing it so I can go back overseas for a couple of years. One of them also got the notion that because of the time the profile was dated I was trying to avoid a medical eval board (MEB); I was so shocked that they were so judgmental and what they supsected.
Now I’m concerned again about my quality of life for the long term, while I was concerned with the first one, I’m told the second is in a more sensitive area and would cause all sorts of problems if it ever came to getting surgery!
I mentioned before that I might get fired due to my syrinx. I’ve already gone through a MEB a few days ago and awaiting the results which will take a couple of months due to the number of MEB’s in the pipeline. A funny thing happened, as I noted I need to watch my weight because I’m still in the , but i went to pizza hut and got a med thick crust pizza, chocolate dunkers, and bread sticks with diet Pepsi. I later thought this is what the stereotypical woman would do; a guy would have just gotten drunk.
It felt so shitty to be invalidated by almost everyone, even my counselor (seeing the counselor for childhood baggage due to my dad; cause me to shut down for many yrs, also explains why I’m still single) was in rush to get me out of our session today and cutting me off from expressing what I was saying. It might have to do with a mil war exercise that was going on in their unit…or she’s heard all this stuff before. Either way it wasn’t so comforting…
all for now, will take a day at a time after all I’m not in the worst situation, i still have minor pain and numbness, and given the good timing of being in the mil and close to retirement i shouldn't be left standing on a corner w/o anything to fall back on...VA here i come (insert lack of enthusiasm) & hope they can help.
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