Finding shoes is like gold

This is actually a speech that I wrote out for speech class. I was suppose to bring in a article that respresents me and I brought in a pair of shoes. Then presented my speech. In the middle of my speech I dont know why but I started crying IN FRONT OF A CLASS FULL OF PEOPLE I DONT KNOW and my speech was the last speech, so when I was done  there was a pin drop silence for a moment and the I got the loudest appaulause after and I dont know if it was because I was tearing up or because of my actually speech.

  

In 2007 I walked into Target frustrated and determined to find a pair of shoes that fit my feet. As I walked in and I browsed the shoe aisle, I tried on shoe after shoe. Ranging from size 7 to 11 the biggest size they had available. Still no shows fit my feet. Walking out of Target that day I felt exhausted and depleted done with looking for shoes. I said a little prayer in my car that day, I talked to God and I asked him, “If there is a such thing as a next life time, can I have smaller feet?” I went home that night and talked to my mom about what was going on and because she was so annoyed with me always wearing flip flops and convince that I wasn’t able to find shoes that fit because I was fat, gave me $100 and we went to Lenard Wide shoe store. A little embarrassed but a little excited to be able to find shoes that might actually fit. I walked into the shoe store, expecting to be able to find shoes. To my surprise I wasn’t able to find a shoe to fit. I remember the shoe sales person, finally finding a pair that he knew would stretch out. Put those shoes on me and for the first time in two years, I was able to fit a pair of shoes. They weren’t the prettiest pair of shoes but none the less they were black and almost dressy shoes that I could almost hide underneath a pair of long slacks. Which happen to be these very pair of shoes, worn down and beaten up?  Every once in a while I walked into shoe stores looked around if no one was around, I would gather the courage up to try a pair of shoes on.

I would make jokes to my friends and family I would ask them, if they thought feet could grow, when your 25. Everyone would just laugh it off and say no, including me. Who in the world would think at the age of 25 your feet were growing!? Pretty, funny concept apparently that concept isn’t that funny. About three years after walking into that Target, my neurologist called me and told me I had a pituitary tumor, late last year. She immediately ordered some tests and sent me in for this blood work. I found out that not only did, I have tumor but that tumor was pushing on the pituitary gland causing the gland to secrete something called HGH (human growth hormone). In a normal person there HGH for a women is suppose to be between 1-10 and a male 1-5, mine was 72.

I found a doctor here that looked over everything and immediately sent me to Cedar Sinai in California in order to do more testing. I took a trip to California and got a bunch of blood work and brain MRI’s. The blood work they did was suppose to suppress my growth hormone and show me what my IGF-1 Levels were, in this test my IGF-1 levels were suppose to be between 88-300 and mine was at 1009.  They were able to confirm that I had something called Acromegaly.

Left me a swirl of confusion, questions, relief and answers, acromegaly is a  form of gigantism. If this would of happened to me when I was younger, I would be a giant but because it started while I was an adult, Im still growing but not all in height mainly, certain parts of me are growing which the rest of me is staying the same.

Which brought a lot of relief in knowing why I wasn’t able to fit any shoes. Though the swelling in my feet have gone down. I haven’t gone shoe shopping, I keep these shoes to remind myself of the struggle I went through in finding these shoes and to remind my self to be compassionate to people daily. Because I don’t know what there going through. I should know my self inside and out and not to take myself for granted. I should never dimiss what someone is going through, just because it doesn’t seem that bad to me. Though not being able to find shoes might not be a big deal to someone else. These shoes helped my doctor to look for the tumor that caused my Acromegaly.

Life Lesson: Speeches are not that scary after all!

My blood work and the different gh and igf-1 levels

I wrote this out months ago but didnt post it...so Im posting it as is. I will be going in soon to have more blood work.

My growth hormones are supposed to be between 1-10 and mine on 07/19/2010 was 71.9 when the doctor first told me.

The Chart below

Men	Less than 5 nanograms per milliliter (ng/mL) (less than 220 picomoles per liter [pmol/L]) Normally between 1-5, Five being high
Women	Less than 10 ng/mL (less than 440 pmol/L) Normally between 1-10, ten being high
Children to teens	Less than 20 ng/mL (less than 880 pmol/L) Normally between 1-20, twenty being high
Babies	15–40 ng/mL (660–1760 pmol/L)

When I went in for a panel of tests,my Igf-1 was suppose to be between 88-340 and mine was originally at *900 in July then when I went in for my glucose tolerance test that would suppress my growth hormone and would give them a more accurate feel for where my growth hormone really sits at in August my IGF-1 level check came in it was at *1003.

My blood work.

My testosterone, free level was suppose to be between 0.1 to 6.4 mine was at *10.2 and
testosterone total reference range is 2 to 45 mine was *53.

I started taking my first Injection to bring my levels down this month"november"; my doctors
 want me to have my levels checked again in three months to see if my levels have stabilized.
 So let’s cross our fingers!

My Life Lesson:

Have Faith and remember I cant CONTROL the outcome of everything......
I cant change or control my situation......in fact there are alot of things out of my control....so I just have to remember to have faith.

Faith; belief in a higher being and or trust in something

Control: the right and power to command, decide, rule, or judge
 and or and The act of exercising controlling power or the condition of being so controlled

Read more: http://www.answers.com/topic/controllability#ixzz1BTxmTofM



m

My personal resume of Acromegaly

My Cover letter 

All of these symptoms and probably more that I just don’t remember at this point, and I’ve had MRI’s, blood tests, jumped from doctor to doctor and no one had a clue, I’ve always considered myself healthy and just thought I was getting old.I thought this was normal ageing process. Even up until this year I thought I was pretty normal/healthy.

click "read more" to access 2nd half of the blog below  

Run down on MY symptoms

 This is just the run down on my symptoms (means its not my symptom):
  

• Increased incidence of glucose intolerance or frank diabetes mellitus, hypertension, and cardiovascular disease
• Thryroid
• Increase risk of different Cancers caused by excessive and prolonged GH and IGF-1 in the body 
• Memory loss, forgetfulness and the ability to focus and concentrate,impaired thought process
• Soft tissue swelling of internal organs, notably the heart with attendant weakening of its muscularity and the kidneys
• Enlarged liver, heart, kidneys, spleen and other organs
• Increased incidence of congestive heart failure, which might be due to uncontrolled hypertension or to an intrinsic form of cardiomyopathy attributable to excess GH/IGF-I.
• Shortness of breath  
• Chest pain
• Palpitations or rapid heart beat 
• Easy fatigue, decreased muscle strength (weakness)
• Poor exercise tolerance
• Brittle bones, low bone density
• Back pain, Arthritis, limited joint movement, swelling of the bony areas around a joint
• Pain, numbness, tingling, or weakness in hands and wrists (carpal tunnel)
• vocal cords, husky voice due to enlarged vocal cords and sinuses resulting in a characteristic thick, enlarged tongue deep voice and slowing of speech 
• Reduced sex drive and in men erectile dysfunction
• Abnormalities of the menstrual cycle and sometimes breast discharge in women
• Infertility
• frequent bladder infections
• Increased thirst or urination 
• Difficulty breathing during sleep (sleep apnea), severe snoring and frequent brief interruptions in night time breathing (sleep apnea) due to tissue swelling that blocks your upper airway, causing poor sleep and excessive sleepiness during the day
• Nausea
•  Loss of smell and taste
• Irritability, anger easily,moodiness and Depression
• Fatigue 
• Vertigo/Dizzyness
• Fainting
• Running into objects, bumping into walls and people
• A symptom where a person is intolerant to changes of temperature particularly heat, hot flashes

Physical changes:

• Soft tissue swelling visibly resulting in enlargement of the, nose, lips and ears. Generalized expansion of the the skull at the fontanelle's. Pronounced brow protrusion, often with ocular distension 

• Increase in ring size or tightness of rings (due to hand swelling, sausage like fingers.) increase in shoe size (due to foot swelling. Thickened skin, especially on palms of hands or soles of feet Enlarged hands and feet, widenedfingers or toes due to skin over growth with swelling, redness, and pain
• Increased chest size causing the appearance of a barrel chest

• Small skin outgrowths skin tags, thickening of the skin, skin is oily are possible markers for colonic polyps. Patients with acromegaly are also at increased risk for polyps of the colon that can develop into cancer.
• Excess hair growth in females
• Weight gain (unintentional)
• Increased perspiration accompanied with body odor

• Hypertrichosis, hyperpigmentation, and hyperhidrosis may occur
• oiliness, acne
• shortened life span
• excessive ear wax 
• Teeth and Jaw problem TMJ, New overbite, under bite, or spreading out of teeth

These symptoms didnt happen all at once it happened gradually over time, so it was hard for me and my doctors to see what was wrong. which leads me to my next blog......

The Tumor,Growth hormones and IGH-1 is the cause of the acromonster

Pituitary tumors can grow quickly and be aggressive, showing signs and symptoms rapidly. While other tumors can grow slowly, causing signs and symptoms to develop and progress slowly over several years. The longer the Growth hormones and IGF -1 stay in your system the more damage it causes.

The doctors dont know how long Ive had my tumor, but according to my symptoms the doctors thinks Ive had the tumor that has caused me to have Acromegaly or the Acromonster for about 8 years now. 
Because my tumor didn't start growing til I was an adult I have Acromegaly, if I were younger and the tumor started I would of be a Giant.

Even though I'm not tall in stature I am still growing, I'm just not growing in height, certain parts of me are growing while the rest of me is staying the same. Causing this disease to be almost debilitating and a daily struggle to continue living a "normal" life and at times leaves me frustrated, in pain but it makes me push myself that much harder to stay as normal as possible.  

Some days I have good days and some days I have bad days

The symptoms can be divided into 2 groups at this point, one being the effects of the tumor pressing on the surrounding tissues. Two being the excess growth hormone GH and the IGF-1 in the blood stream (and vary from person to person):

(I got allot of this information from my own experience and allot of other info from different websites and I don't have time to cite right now, Ill probably add that later, the pictures from google)

First Symptoms due to local mass effects of the tumor, depending on the size of the tumor:

• Headaches and visual field defects are the most common symptoms. Visual field defects depend on which part of the optic nerve pathway is compressed. Headaches and partial loss of vision are the common symptoms
• Tumor damage to the pituitary stalk might cause hyperprolactinemia due to loss of inhibitory regulation of prolactin secretion by the hypothalamus. Damage to normal pituitary tissue can cause deficiencies of glucocorticoids, sex steroids, and thyroid hormone.
• Loss of end organ hormones is due to diminished anterior pituitary secretion of corticotropin (ie, adrenocorticotropic hormone [ACTH]), gonadotropins (eg, luteinizing hormone [LH], follicle-stimulating hormone [FSH]), and thyrotropin (ie, thyroid-stimulating hormone [TSH]).

Symptoms due to excess of GH/IGF-I:

• Excessive height, gigantism (when excess growth hormone is produced as a child) causing gigantism. Prolonged exposure to excess GH before fusion of the growth plates causes increased growth of the long bones and increased height.

People that suffer from Giantism go through there own set of emotional and physical problems, people with Giantism are in pain daily. Despite what people think people with Giantism are not physical strong at all, there bones are brittle and there muscles are weakened.  

• Increased incidence of glucose intolerance or frank diabetes mellitus, hypertension, and cardiovascular disease
• Increase risk of different Cancers caused by excessive and prolonged GH and IGF-1 in the body 
• Memory loss, forgetfulness and the ability to focus and concentrate,impaired thought process
• Soft tissue swelling of internal organs, notably the heart with attendant weakening of its muscularity and the kidneys
• Enlarged liver, heart, kidneys, spleen and other organs
• Increased incidence of congestive heart failure, which might be due to uncontrolled hypertension or to an intrinsic form of cardiomyopathy attributable to excess GH/IGF-I.

• Shortness of breath  
• Chest pain
• Palpitations or rapid heart beat 
• Easy fatigue, decreased muscle strength (weakness)
• Poor exercise tolerance
• Brittle bones, low bone density
• Back pain, Arthritis, limited joint movement, swelling of the bony areas around a joint
• Pain, numbness, tingling, or weakness in hands and wrists (carpal tunnel)
• vocal cords, husky voice due to enlarged vocal cords and sinuses resulting in a characteristic thick, enlarged tongue deep voice and slowing of speech 
• Reduced sex drive and in men erectile dysfunction
• Abnormalities of the menstrual cycle and sometimes breast discharge in women
• Infertility
• frequent bladder infections
• Increased thirst or urination 
• Difficulty breathing during sleep (sleep apnea), severe snoring and frequent brief interruptions in night time breathing (sleep apnea) due to tissue swelling that blocks your upper airway, causing poor sleep and excessive sleepiness during the day
• Nausea
•  Loss of smell and taste
• Irritability, anger easily,moodiness and Depression
• Fatigue 
• Vertigo/Dizzyness
• Fainting
• Running into objects, bumping into walls and people
• A symptom where a person is intolerant to changes of temperature particularly heat, hot flashes

Physical changes:

• Soft tissue swelling visibly resulting in enlargement of the, nose, lips and ears.

 

• Generalized expansion of the the skull at the fontanelle's. Pronounced brow protrusion, often with ocular distension

• Increase in ring size or tightness of rings (due to hand swelling, sausage like fingers.) increase in shoe size (due to foot swelling. Thickened skin, especially on palms of hands or soles of feet Enlarged hands and feet, widened fingers or toes due to skin over growth with swelling, redness, and pain
• Increased chest size causing the appearance of a barrel chest

• Small skin outgrowths skin tags, thickening of the skin, skin is oily are possible markers for colonic polyps. Patients with acromegaly are also at increased risk for polyps of the colon that can develop into cancer.
• Excess hair growth in females
• Weight gain (unintentional)
• Increased perspiration accompanied with body odor

• Hypertrichosis, hyperpigmentation, and hyperhidrosis may occur
• oiliness, acne
• excessive ear wax 
• Teeth and Jaw problem TMJ, New overbite, under bite, or spreading out of teeth

Through my daily struggle seems hard at times and my bad days are BAD, I am thankful that with this  I have been given the gift of waking up with my good days and really being able to appreciate MY good days, because now my average days are good and my good days are heavenly. I was given the gift to understand whats really important in life. What it really means to live.

I think people that are "sick" and survive really understand what it means to live.

My Life Lesson:


Remember its not just my physical appearance I have to worry about its the effects this has taken on my inside.

 Just because people look healthy on the outside doesn't mean their healthy on the inside whether mental, emotionally,physically. Try to remember to be compassionate daily.



Getting back into the cause of my disease

So now that I got that off my chest and I feel better that everyone understands the pituitary gland a bit more, I feel like I can move forward. ppl actually have things wrong with their pituitary gland that could be the cause of their aches, pains, emotional pains, and mental pains and don’t realize it, that’s actually a part of the reason I wanted to put this out there.  

Drum roll for the Cause of the disease but not the actually disease

A tumor has started growing on my pituitary gland, there are different types of tumors you can have for my situation there is two types of tumors a micro adenoma and a marco adenoma, the difference is anything that is less then 1 cm is considered a Micro which is “easily” removed and they say usually wont grow back and anything that is over 1cm is considered a marco adenoman. Marco tumors can be removed “easily” but often have a higher chance of the tumor growing back. Now remembering that the Pit gland is the size of a pea and in the base of your head, my tumor has grown into a macro according to my MRI on 8/16/10 and is 1.88 cm, almost 2cm.

Which is still okay because it is still removable because most micro and macro tumors happen to grow around the pit gland which if the tumor is big enough it can crush the pit gland or if the micro is aggressive enough will ruin.Either one is not good, however it is easier to access and can be removed with little to no damage (as long as you have a good surgeon) with the chance of it growing back later.

The tumor can decide to get really crazy and grow out past the pituitary area and invade other areas.

 My tumor got bored and has grown into my sinus cavity area. This is where it gets kind of tricky for me, Which I guess I’m still learning about this part of  the whole thing, so I may have to correct myself later on with this, so it’s probably not as in depth or completely correct.

Apparently theres this soft boney tissue that holds the pituitary gland. People with the type of tumor I have the tumor would normally stay inside the boney area by the pit gland and not invade other areas.

The fun part is my tumor has actually grown THREW the boney wall that holds the gland and has grown around the right cavernous carotid artery. Where the doc said they wont go over to the sinus cavity area where the cavernous carotid artery is because if they even nicked it I could die. Ill get more into that story later. below are more illistrations

pit gland



This is the Carotid Artery/ a main vein that runs from your heart and supplys oxygen to your brain the tumor has wrapped its self around the vein



 

This is where the caverous sinus area is that tumor has grown through from the pit gland to the vein                             


 

from the pitutary gland to the sphenoid bone to  the caverous sinus area encased the vein                                                




                                            

 My life lesson:

Where there's a will there's a way

Functions of your Glands bio 101

 

The Pituitary gland is based in the middle of your brain behind your nose right in the center. they even call it the "master gland" of your body. I am very visual so here’s what it looks like,

I’ve never heard of it prior to all of this craziness. They actually say because it’s such an important gland it’s in the middle of the brain so it can be protected. It’s about the size of a pea literally. It controls all of the other glands in your body example the Thyroid is a popular gland the pituitary gland controls but there’s many more glands and hormones it controls:

Growth Hormone (GH): This is the principal hormone that, among many other functions, regulates body and brain development, bone maturation, metabolism and is essential for healthy muscles.

Luteinizing Hormone (LH) and Follicle Stimulating Hormone (FSH): These hormones control the production of sex hormones (estrogen and testosterone) as well as sperm and egg maturation and release.                                                                                                         

Prolactin (PRL): This hormone stimulates secretion of breast milk.                  

Thyroid Stimulating Hormone (TSH):  This hormone stimulates the thyroid gland to release thyroid hormones. Thyroid hormones control basal metabolic rate and play an important role in growth and maturation. Thyroid hormones affect almost every organ in the body.

Adrenocorticotropic Hormone (ACTH): This hormone triggers the adrenal glands (located above the kidneys) to release the hormone cortisol which in turn, regulates carbohydrate, fat, and protein metabolism and is essential in the stress response.

Vasopressin - Also called anti-diuretic hormone (ADH): This hormone promotes water to be reabsorbed by the kidneys and is thus essential in water and electrolyte balance.

If the pituitary goes out of wack then your whole hormonal system is out of wack. Now that I think we’ve got the basics on what the pituitary functions. I hope we all realize now if there is something wrong with your pituitary gland then your completely throw out of wack.

Tip: You should ask your self if any of thing on this list, seem out of wack for your self

Life lesson for myself: 

I should know my self inside and out, not take my body for granted