Ride ‘em broncho-scopy. It seems that’s what Señor Pulmonologist will be doing on Tuesday the 12th @ 7:00 AM. And I guess metaphorically I’ll be the bronco. Okay. A new doctor, for a new day, with a new test. How can you go wrong with that? I guess I could come up with a few answers. So … yes … Dr H is going to knock me out, shove a scope down my throat, have a look see, and mine some samples while he’s in there. I can hardly wait! Then he’ll send them off to be mused at, sliced diced and julienned …. and I’ll have to wait another week to get those results. This all seems to just drag on. To top it all off he also wants to send me for an echocardiogram to be certain granulomas haven’t started forming in my heart. He also suggested I see a ophthalmologist. Now I was going to make that journey on my own … but now with a little prodding … (move along there bronco boy!) I’ll make that appointment sooner than later.

Thank you Hanz & Franz. Thank you Dr Mike. Steroids is the name. Treating Sarcoidosis is the game. Well as much as one can “treat” this disease. As Dr Mike told me today, “Sarcoidosis is the ‘soft’ diagnosis” for what’s going on with me. In other words … this is what we think it is. Now I will have to follow the yellow brick road from Emerald City Medical Arts to the pulmonologist he will send me to. But right now it’s mega-steroids for the next six day. I just took my first three pills. Five today. Four tomorrow … etc etc etc … for the next six day. So if I talk to you between now & then & I’m a bit “snappish” please forgive me ahead of time … for the drugs know not what they do.

Dr Mike says the roids will help my breathing “issues” … so that’s a good thing. I’m still not sure whether granulomas are forming in my lungs, along with the lymph nodes being enlarged. All I got from our meeting this morning was that the “shadowing” and the lymph node enlargement were probably causing my “breathing issues.” (My words … not Dr M’s.) From all the blood testing I STILL have elevated liver functions. This has been going on for a long time. My liver is also enlarged, according to images from an upper body ultrasound I had a few months ago. His thinking is that, knowing Sarcoidosis can affect any organ, my liver could have been the first casualty.

“I just called to tell you …” Well he didn’t say he loved me, but he did say I have some “black shadowing” on my lungs and some enlarged lymph nodes. I have to give him … that’s Dr Mike (for those of you keeping score) … his props. I went for the chest x-ray just yesterday. He called me with the results, just moments ago. He’s already got me set up to do a chest CT scan. Quick. Direct. Efficient. That’s how I like my physicians …. then again that’s how I like most people. But this is Seattle. Passive aggressive is the modus operandi here … but I digress.

As I go through the laundry list of symptoms … swelling ankles, check … sores on legs, check … appearance of non caseating granulomas, check … shadowing on lungs, check … swollen lymph nodes, check. Hell … that’s one big laundry list … and it tells me I’m washed up. Well maybe not so much washed up as hosed. Right now it’s tough to know what I’m feeling. So I’ll wait on the CT scan & see what news that brings.

For those of you who haven’t Googled sarcoidosis yet ….

Never thought I’d see the day I started blogging. Do I have a concept? No. Not yet anyway. But here it is the first entry, ground zero, all busted cherries & the like. What will it be? Don’t know yet … Maybe I’ll document my trials & tribulations with my latest physical malady!

I’m off for a chest x-ray. I’m on the hunt. I’m trying to find out if I have a cute little number called Sarcoidosis. Or not. A couple of wonderful lumps just magically appeared on my forehead. Went to bed one night … no problems. Woke up the next morning … two lumps the size of peas. They were hard … and sometimes they hurt.

After playing stump the doctor with my primary (un)care(ing) physician (PCP) & a dermatologist that just shrugged & said … “no clue” … I had a plastic surgeon remove them. His best line was, (in the middle of surgery) ” Wow … I’ve never seen anything like this before.” That’s always something you want to hear when a 70 year old man is scraping at your head with a sharp scalpel. The other is “oops … that looks like a nerve … maybe I shouldn’t go near that.”