Golf and fitness

We were back at the hospital last week. We are all out of sync with our appointments due to the Easter holiday (their’s not ours) and we had to go on Thursday instead of the usual Tuesday.

A very efficient Associate Consultant (whatever that means) briskly talked through the highlights: Light Chains “still within normal range”; creatinine level raised, so they are monitoring that; the biopsy of FL’s breast “was benign, consistent with gynaecomastia”; his cough is probably due to the bug that is going round which lasts 6 to 8 weeks. She did not explain the detail of any of that, and after waiting 4 hours to be seen, we had lost the energy to ask questions – pathetic of us, I admit it.

So back home to good old Dr Google:

Gynaecomastia is a painless male breast lump usually caused by hormonal changes – “only one third will be due to a pathological cause”, with examples given on the web of testicular failure of various sorts, or drug side effects. The hospital has shown no interest in further investigations – no, they haven’t checked his testes, which the web suggests should be done as a matter of course. Should we worry? I don’t know. And I haven’t told FL yet.

High creatinine levels are indicative of poor kidney function.

The doctor also asked about FL’s fingers and toes – any tingling? Yes, he told her they were sometimes numb, but that they didn’t stop him playing golf. That made her laugh – nothing to worry about, then! But later at home he said to me that he was finding it hard to do up his buttons. This is peripheral neuropathy, and can be caused by the Thalidomide or the Multiple Myeloma itself.

On Saturday he was too tired to eat dinner, which is unheard of. On Sunday he complained that he had limited vision in his right eye and a headache. Same story on Monday. I told him he MUST get it investigated. Even if it is “just” migraine, it is a new symptom – FL never gets headaches. So what is he doing today? You guessed – golfing!