MizFlutterby

First, to anyone who responds to my post, a HUGE thank you! I'm absolutely terrified out of my mind; the gastroenterologist I was sent to was so rude to me; made me feel as if I was a nasty, dirty person (I'm not, but even if I were, I would deserve better treatment than that - EVERYONE does!) who caused this to herself and deserved it. Trust me; that end's an OUTTIE, not an INNIE!! To each their own - I'm no judge, but me personally? I was violently raped many, many years ago, and that particular "end" (yeah, pun intended! ) holds no interest for me! (They are cute to look at though! Anyway, he "forgot" to give me the results of the biopsy (polyp removed; in recovery he told me it was no big deal, and to call them in 20 days if I hadn't heard from him), when I called to get them at the 20-day mark, his nurse was appalled and said it was stuck at the bottom of his stack, and that she was moving it to the top; she'd make sure he'd get in touch with me. He called me about 5:30 that night and said I probably had cancer and it was caused by the HPV virus, and that I had a husband, right? I told him I'd been divorced for over 14 years, to which he, with anger in his voice said, "well, you have a PARTNER then, right???" I again said no; had been single for close to two years. He said, no, you MUST have a partner!!". I reiterated my statement that I'd been single for almost two years, then he got really angry and said "well, they need to be tested!" He's just told me I probably have cancer, and now he's making me feel as if I'VE given THEM some disease?? Trust me, I'm a very clean woman, and am VERY careful about who I'm with; I check with my doctor before I get in a relationship to ensure I don't have anything, and try to ensure he does the same thing - or thought I did (last guy cheated). I felt nasty, dirty, like some sort of ****. I got off the phone shaking; more upset about the fact that I had an STD and had just been treated like Typhoid Mary than the fact that I may have cancer. It was a bad night. I promptly forgot any tiny bit of information he gave me and tried calling the following day to get a call back from him, to no avail. He wouldn't call back. Not the following day, either. I was told the following day I could make an appointment if I wanted to find out more information. Yeah, like I want to deal with THAT a&& again - NOT!

So, I asked his nurse what was written in my chart as far as what the pathology showed; she said that the polyp that was removed was a "condyloma acuminata with focal severe dysplasia (and from what I recall, it's right at the edge of my rectum). I saw my gynocologist Thursday; she read a bit of a report from the pathologist who is recommending (I'll try to remember this part as best I can) biopsies of the anus and rectum, as well as the peri-anal area, biopsies, perhaps, of the vulva (not sure of that though), and thorough exam of the area around and between the vagina and anus. No need for biopsies of cervix, as I had a complete hysterectomy at 34 y.o. Not sure if HPV can invade vaginal walls though, and if biopsies need to be done there? Also unsure if a second opinion colonoscopy would be a good idea?

My questions to all of you are this: What am I dealing with? What IS this, other than HPV, which, really, means nothing to me. Reading through a bit on this blog (which, btw, I am SOOOOOOOO grateful to have found!!!) it appears to be more than I thought. It "seemed" to be "nothing more" than something that would go away on its own in a couple years; sometimes if a person got a "bad" version of the virus you might end up with cancer, but otherwise, no biggie. The little I've gleaned (admittedly not much), this doesn't appear to be the case. I'm seeing my surgeon on Monday, and I'd really like to be somewhat armed with some knowledge. I can't seem to find ANYTHING about an HPV rectal polyp; don't know what severe dysplasia means, don't have a CLUE what treatment for this could entail (whether it's cancerous or not), and worst of all (on an admittedly shallow plane), how on EARTH does a person tell family that it's HPV and not cancer, if that's what it turns out to be - particularly MINE?!? They'd make that doctor look like a walk in the park... Oh, and somewhere down the line, maybe, a question. Does it ever go away? You know, as in "if I ever met a man and fell in love, could I ever have sex again?", or should I just pretend I'm 90 and decide right now that part of my life's done and over with because now I really AM Typhoid Mary for the REST OF MY LIFE!!?? And how, HOW do you deal with the anger towards the person who gave it to you???

As you can probably tell, I'm scared, I'm angry, I'm confused, and I have no knowledge about this at all. I apologize for babbling on, and I hope you were able to cull through the word vomit to get the information I wanted to pass on so that you could answer the questions I so desperately need answered. I hope, too, that you'll forgive me for being so "needy" and feeling the need to tell you more than you probably needed to hear about the gastroenterologist; but somehow, maybe I think that since we're dealing with HPV someone else may have had a similar experience (I hope not!!) or at least can understand my feelings of being made to feel guilty when it wasn't MY fault, which made me angry. It's not something I can just go around telling people; stupid as THIS sounds, I hope it IS cancer and NOT HPV, because there's no way I can tell my family it's HPV and get any kind of concern at all. All they'd hear is "STD" and they'd be humiliated - doesn't matter about ANYTHING else. Not how I live my life, nothing. Not statistics, nothing. Just that term. All of a sudden, it'd be all my fault somehow. How do you tell people when you're dealing with something that appears to be as big as this appears to be?? And how do you deal with it when you've a relative newcomer to your city, and your friends live in other states?

Wow. I'm a mess. I hope someone has some words of advice!! (And a great joke would be AWESOME!! *grin*)

Thanks for listening. And thanks for your time...

~~R