Here Comes Treble: Listen To Your Body
...In the 21st Century, with medical knowledge and ability to prevent suffering at an all-time high, anyone who ignores symptoms of change and discomfort is asking for trouble. This doesn’t mean that all conditions are life-threatening, or that all can be cured or successfully treated. More than ever before, however, if a problem is diagnosed early the likelihood of a happy, comfortable and long life is far greater than ever before in history...
Isabel Bradley brings what could be the most important advice that you ever read.
Jean was a young mother of 26 with two young children to raise, a minimum of help around the large house she lived in and no family nearby to call on for help. She began to lose weight and felt increasingly exhausted. “Quite natural,” I hear you say, “most young mothers are exhausted.” That may be true, but in spite of natural tiredness, most young mothers have sufficient energy to cope with the housework, keep an eye on the children, have fun with them and find time to bake, knit, sew and spend time with friends.
Jean was permanently exhausted, and wasn’t coping. Her body was telling her that something was wrong. She visited her GP, who poked and prodded around the base of her neck. He told her she had a lump in her thyroid, causing it to malfunction, hence the weight-loss and tiredness. At his recommendation, she consulted a surgeon. Within days she was in an operating theatre counting backwards to oblivion.
While she was under anaesthesia, the surgeon removed the lump, sent it to the laboratory over the road for analysis and stitched her up. The results, however, were returned to the operating room just before Jean was to be brought back to consciousness: the lump was a self-contained cancerous tumour. The surgeon re-opened the wound and removed the entire thyroid. It was a four-hour procedure, and it took Jean months to recover. But, her recovery was complete. Thanks to modern medicine, she doesn’t miss her thyroid at all, she takes a tiny pill six days a week and thirty years after the operation is healthier than before the operation.
Because Jean ‘listened’ to her body’s tale of exhaustion, she lived.
After a regular check-up, Mary was told she needed a hysterectomy. At the tender age of 32 it was quite a shock, but she was so uncomfortable that she agreed to the surgery. As well as the mass of fibroids in her uterus, the surgeon found ‘galloping pre-cancer’ cells. Apart from one episode of sobbing into her husband’s shoulder, grieving for all the children she would never have, she hasn’t regretted surrendering her uterus for one moment. She watched a friend die because, when the pre-cancer cells were detected she decided on one last pregnancy before the hysterectomy. By the time the baby was born, the cancer was full-blown and had moved into her liver…
One might think that these two young ladies were extremely lucky – both cancers were completely removed with surgery, there was no need for chemo or radiation therapy. However, it wasn’t only luck. The fact that they sought help at the first sign of unusual discomfort and went for regular health checks meant early diagnosis which made total cure possible.
Not listening to one’s body can have severe results. Brian had a run-in with cancer of the intestine several years ago. A length of his bowel was removed, he had to live with a colostomy bag, but thought he’d got off lightly. He didn’t go for the six-monthly check-ups which should have been recommended. When he developed severe lower-back pain, he consulted various neuro-surgeons, and didn’t think to mention the earlier cancer. He underwent several spinal surgeries. After each, the pain became worse. Eventually, after several years of agony, he insisted on a spinal scan. The radiographer broke the news that his pain was being caused by a tumour the size of an orange at the base of his spine. It was inoperable. A year later, after undergoing strong and extremely uncomfortable chemo, radiation and steroid therapies, Brian died.
Perhaps, if he’d gone for regular check-ups, or insisted on different tests and second opinions from different specialists, the secondary cancer could have been found and dealt with. He may even have still been with us…
In the 21st Century, with medical knowledge and ability to prevent suffering at an all-time high, anyone who ignores symptoms of change and discomfort is asking for trouble. This doesn’t mean that all conditions are life-threatening, or that all can be cured or successfully treated. More than ever before, however, if a problem is diagnosed early the likelihood of a happy, comfortable and long life is far greater than ever before in history.
Until thel next time…. ‘here comes Treble!’
© Copyright Reserved 2010
by Isabel Bradley
