The Return of the Shrinking Man
Tuesday, November 4th, 2008
Last month or so I had a followup appointment with one of my doctors. The nurse weighed me and asked me my height. I told her 5 feet, six and a half inches. I use to be 5 feet seven or so, but I knew I had shrunk a little this past year. She measured me at 5 feet, 5 and a half inches. I was shocked! How weird!
I was proud of the fact that I had lost over ten pounds in the last few months. But this was way different. I remembered that in college I usually gave my height as 5 feet 7 and a half. But that was just hopeful thinking. What was going on now?
Then I remembered the movie “The Incredible Shrinking Man” that I watched in the 1950’s as a kid. I remembered really liking the movie, and just wanted to check it out. I ordered it from Netflix for Halloween. The movie was even better than I remembered it. But my God, it was like watching a biography of my current life! The shrinking man discovers he is getting smaller after a strange cloud passes over him while boating. He visits his doctor and tells him how tall he was in high school and how he seems to be shrinking. He’s had to buy new clothes, just like I have. Eventually, his doctor sends him to a special testing lab where he gets an “RAI” (radioactive iodine) treatment! Just like I’m getting next week. They could have filmed a remake of this movie at my house.
Yesterday, I spent most of the day at the Nuclear Medicine Clinic, starting my “dosimetry” to determine how much radiation to get this time. The technician was telling me that he’s had a significant increase in the number of patients with my condition since my last trip there last year. I asked if he had any thoughts on why that might be and suggested something like the fallout from the Chernobyl disaster back in the 1980’s. My first thought was the opening scene of the “Incredible Shrinking Man” where the cloud passes over him. Wow, we knew a lot about the future back in the 80’s!
I took a pinhole camera on my visit this morning. It accompanied me to the edge of the scanner. I’ll post it if it comes out.
Good health to all!
The hospital trip and treatment was definitely interesting. The radioactive iodine arrived in a lead canister. Josh, the nuclear medicine technican who has been involved with with almost all of my testing and data collection, prepared the iodine. I drank it down and was surprised at what a neutral taste it had. It tasted a bit like burnt ozone (how would I know that?), but not that unpleasant. That was it. Josh left and I waited to throw up. That was the biggest concern everyone expressed - that I would throw up and it would have all been for nothing. And this stuff is expensive. But, I didn’t throw up. I didn’t even feel queezy. 