Welcome back to the rollercoaster.
It has been one heck of a ride these last few weeks. I made the decision to look into what surgical options I have available to help reduce the side effects caused by my lipoedema. This lead me down the path of making an appointment with Dr Chris Lekich who I kept hearing about on the many lipoedema Facebook pages I follow. I decided to see Dr Lekich as he is Brisbane based and had many positive reviews. At my first appointment he did a quick ultrasound of my legs and said that I would need a further scan of all my veins but it was likely that I will need to get some treatment on my right leg and possibly my left as well. He also said that if I wanted to look at surgery I would require three liposuction surgeries to remove the lipoedema fat.
1st- lower legs (calves, shins, ankles)
2nd- front of thighs & knees
3rd- back of thighs, hips and butt.
Each costing approximately between $13,000-$14,000.
Next appointment was booked in however this time I had to travel down to the Gold Coast to see Dr Lekich and get an Venous Doppler ultrasound on both of my legs. I was also booked in to get a bubble test done. (I had to google what this was originally. It is a test to see if there is a hole in your heart or (PFO) Patent Foramen Ovale).
First up was the doppler ultrasound. The lovely lady who was doing the ultrasound prewarned me that I may get lightheaded from standing still and if this happens to let her know so I can walk on the spot and move the blood around a bit more. To which I laughed at. I work in a retail job which involves standing a lot, often standing still. I was going to be perfectly fine having to stand still for less than 10 minutes during the scan. Oh how I was wrong! Not three minutes in I started to get light headed, ridiculous right?! I was so annoyed at myself for letting this happen. The ultrasound technician actually got me to lay down as all the colour had drained from my face, I was clammy and my temperature spiked. All of this because I had to stand still while she did the scan, I was so frustrated at my body for not being able to do such a simple task. Ten minutes later I was back upright and we completed the scan. The results were a 50/50 good news bad news situation. My left leg only had a small vein on the back top section of my calf that didn't want to behave. My right leg, well now that is a whole other story. From the CVI report none of the veins on my right leg were functioning the way they should be. (see above) The red veins are the misbehaving ones.
"Chronic venous insufficiency (CVI) occurs due to inadequate functioning of venous wall and/or valves in lower limb veins resulting in excessive pooling of blood."https://radiopaedia.org/articles/chronic-venous-insufficiency To simplify that, my valves in the right leg don't function how they should and allow blood to pool in my leg rather than sending it back up towards my heart. On bad days this means my right leg tends to ache significantly more and is often larger than my left. Fun right?! For me to continue on the journey to surgery I will need to get those veins fixed, which will end up costing up to $10,000. (Deep breath, that's the cheap part of this road to discovery!)
Next up was the bubble test. I must admit, the day of these appointments really didn't want to be my day. First I almost fainted during the ultrasound, and then when the nurse was putting in the canular for the bubble test unfortunately a nerve was hit. The level of pain from this I cannot even begin to describe to you. I have what I like to think is a pretty high pain tolerance but this almost crippled me. The poor nurse had to deal with me swearing, crying and doing everything within my power not to jerk my arm away from her. Instead I was stomping my feet and clenching my jaw. The pain scale definitely hit a 12/10 for this one!
The doctor then came in, put the canular in the opposite arm and we were off and running. I walked into this thinking it was just another thing I had to check of the pre surgery list and we would move on. I had my tonsils out when I was 8, and surely if I had a hole in my heart then they would have discovered it long before I turned 30. Oh how I was wrong. Cue the second crushing blow for the day. My bubble study came back positive for a PFO.
The referral I was given even went as far as stating a 'strongly positive study' of a 'significant right to left shunt is present'. Never have I hated being such an over achiever in all of my life! Strongly and significantly quickly became two words that I was beginning to dislike immensely. This felt like such a crushing blow after I felt like I had finally gotten my head around needing three liposuction surgeries. I had a plan. A hole in the heart was most certainly not part of this plan! Added to all of this, the bubble test gave me a migraine. My vision was blurred immediately after the test and stayed blurred for about an hour. The next day I felt like I had been hit by a bus, and this was just what I was physically feeling. The emotional side was a whole other issue.
Next step towards draining all of my bank accounts is the cardiologist. Stay tuned for what's up next! Much love, Katie
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