I completely forgot to celebrate the anniversary of my not needing to have liver surgery! I’m usually pretty good about remembering dates and anniversaries, even the weird ones, and somehow this one just slipped my mind. I know it’s not something that I have to remember every year, and with my liver, there are a few different dates that are milestones. But I usually seem to remember to celebrate mid-April when I found out the tumors were shrinking and when I was supposed to have surgery but didn’t need it. I don’t always celebrate on the same date, but April 20th is when the surgery was supposed to be so that date usually sticks in my head.
I’m not too upset that I forgot to celebrate this. I do like to celebrate how awesome it is that this all worked out this way for me, but it’s also nice that it’s not something that dominates my mind anymore. From when I found out about the tumors until the surgery was canceled, this really was a huge focus of my life. I tried to not always think about it, but it’s hard not to when you are preparing for a major surgery and staying in the hospital for an unknown amount of time. Even just planning things out with my parents and where I’d be recovering took a lot of time and organization. And after we found out the tumors were shrinking, I still thought about the tumors a lot because I was always worried that my next scan would show that they grew or something else was wrong.
When I had my last liver MRI, which was exactly 5 years to the day since the first one, the tumors didn’t show any growth or change and my liver surgeon agreed that I no longer need to be monitored. I will always probably have at least one of the tumors (only one is visible but the other two might still be there but too small to be seen), but they are no longer a health risk for me. And since I don’t have to be monitored, I’m not really thinking about it anymore. I don’t have to be scared that something will happen because of how big the tumors are or the various risks that I was warned about when they were found.
This is different from how things are with my hip. I’m frequently reminded of the pain and the fact that I still need surgeries in the future. I can’t ignore that this is still an ongoing health issue for me. I guess the tumors can be considered an ongoing health issue as well, but it’s not something I have to confront on a regular basis. I’m not ignoring the fact that I have them, so I’m still not really drinking since that can stress my liver and I won’t go back on hormonal birth control since that would likely make the tumors grow again. There are a few things in my future that might require me to be monitored again, but they aren’t things that I need to worry about or that would happen unexpectedly.
And the more I’m removed from thinking that I need to have surgery, the more likely it will be that I forgot to remember about it. I’ve had so many random health things I’ve had to deal with over the years, and it’s not a bad thing to not always remember all of them. And yes, celebrating something awesome like not needing surgery is good. But not having to spend time thinking about a stressful time in my life is probably better.
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