Second Opinions

I have been going along with the idea that my thyroid irrepairable and that I should have it nuked with a radioactive isotope. This would mean I would have to take a synthetic thyroid replacement pill every day for the rest of my life. That's what the Endocrinologist said he was going to do to me, so I didn't really think about alternatives. However Dena has been keen that I get a second opinion and my friend Paul made the case for a second opinion quite succinctly.

"Well Mr. Crawford we are just going to cut off your balls and give you these artificial balls that you will use for the rest of your life."
Er... well yes, I would get a second opinion if they were going to do that, so I guess I might as well get one about my thyroid, which is afterall a rather important organ.

Dena gets me an appointment with someone her friend sees, who turns out to be only about 300 yards from my house- At least he's local. He turns out to be quite diffent from Endocrinologist #1 with a receptionist who is actually compitent.
"I'll run you on the thyroid blocker for 1 year and graduallly tail it off. You have up to a 40% chance that your thyroid will return to normal and you won't have a relapse."

Well that's different! What's the down side? Crudelly put I can take 3 pills a day for 1 year or 1 pill a day for the rest of my life. Either way I am taking pills for at least a year. The 3 pills can have side effects but only on 1 in about 5000 people and so far I haven't been that 1.

I now have 48 hours to decide whether to see Endocrinologist #1 or go with Endocrinologist #2. Should I keep my thyroid or not for year?

Nowhere in my online web research does it say you should try and keep your thyroid because...
For sure, there are patients with horror stories of not being able to get the levels of the synthetic hormome right, but there are also horror stories of patients whose thyroid went up and down all year round and drove them to getting it killed off. I'm not interested in unqualified opinons. What I want is a Dr. to say "Given the choice between killing it off and keeping it i.e. going with a 40% chance of remission you should keep it because..."
But no medical person on the entire internet that I can find will say "because...".
Maybe it's obvious? I am part of an entire generation of people who had their tonsils removed because they were a useless part of the body, only to discover later that in fact millions of years of evolution was in fact right and they were in fact a useful in fighting infection.

Matt gives me a call: He wants to have teaspoon that he left in a hotel in Las Vegas shipped to me so I can bring it back to the UK with me on my next trip. I talk through my options with him, not a Dr. but a good friend who helped me understand my options regarding employment with ARM in the past and by listening and simply pointing out the bl**ding obvious, he is always a great help.

So I'll keep my thyroid for a year and see what happens!