Cutting Heads

This is NOTHING like my cut...but how cool is this?











Sooooo..... “The MOHS Surgery.... does anyone really care? I am not sure that I do. My wife accompanied me to the doctors office/surgery center. The process went exactly as promised. I showed up at 7:45 and by 8:15 they had a small chunk of my precious forehead out. Now I am sitting in the waiting room waiting for them to examine “the margins” before they go back in and cut some more away. Evidiently thse nasty little basal cells have tendrils or “legs” and so as to be least invasive as possible they follow these legs and excevate them rather then cutting the whole chunk of your head out. I guess it it is only head in my case since my basal cell is in the middle of my lower forehead. I say “lower” forehead because any of you who know me know that I have a vast expanse of forehead. People have often analogized my forehead as approximating that of a Beluga whale. The Bleuga is not a particularly graceful looking whale. Not to belabor the point but billboard companies have shown more then a casual interest in my head for advertising space..... so... lower fore head.

When they first took me in there they had to shove a couple of needles in my forehead as local anesthetic. It hurt. I never understand why they have to give you a shot in order to limit your pain. The shots seem painful... especially when they shove the needles into your head. The numb it pretty good and the funny nurse tells me they give me a “numb skull”. Ahahahhaahahaha. The doctor comes in and they put something over my eyes and then I feel pressure as she carves on me quickly and efficiently. The real reason they put something over your eyes is because they do MOHS surgery with a samurai sword. If you have ever seen Uma Thurman in “Kill Bill” you have some idea of what I am talking about. They cover your eyes because, according to my doctor, “bad shit happens when you flinch”. I believe her.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohs_surgery

I am a solid 20 years younger then any one else in the waiting room. They come back and tell me that I am “clear”. In MOHS parlance that means that they got it all and do not need to cut on me anymore. Clearly it is a relief because that means my basal cell didn’t have and “legs” or tendrils digging deep into my huge...huge skull. Still, I cannot help feeling cheated that didn’t have a better, more dangerous cancer or surgery. It is a disappointment, and a relief until they take me back in to sew me up. That means I have to get another bunch of shots in head to numb my head. The shots suck even worse the second time. She puts about a millionstitched into me head and explains she is going to do the stitches on one of the many “frown lines” that cover my head like waves of sand in the sahara.

I called my mom. She picked me up and took me home. Lets not discuss the fact that I am 48 and my mommy is still picking me up and taking me home. At least lets not talk about it now.

Fungus...Aong Us

Skin Cancer!
FUNGUS!










One of the many joys of being old, pale, bald and my fathers son is a genetic weakness for skin related cancers, fungises, maladies, parasites and other grotesqe things which in Biblical times would have relegated me to a colony somewhere away from people. Clearly there is a certain portion of the public which would applaud me taken and removed generally from society but this would have nothing to do with my skin condition.

In everything, in every facet of my life, every weakness, vice, failure or unhappiness, no matter how small or petty, I blame my father. It is such a simple catch all. By the time when he was my age and teaching Sunday School he had a whole raft of little Lutheran kids thinking he might or might not be the devil, because they had already carved out two chunks of his head with skin cancer problems. He is also hair impaired and evidently as a child my father was forced by my grandmother to play outside all the time (babrbaric). My father by the way might or might not be the devil but the point was that he told the children that the equidistant scars on his forehead were where they had removed his horns. That is my dad.

My mother tried to keep me out of the sun and being a rather effeminate kid with a total lack of motor skills it was not too hard. In high school and college I took to wearing bandanas and ball caps since the hair started to thin at about 18. Anyway... I have been through a number of skin doctors but have finally found one to stay with. Of the several others a few stand out in blessed memory. One who was freezing half a dozen things on my body every time I showed up and another who never got that close. Everytime I tried to show him something on my skin he would move away and tell me “it is a fungus, we all have them all over our bodies”, like he was sharing some mystical incantation. He was not. My wife has since excused he backing away from my disease as “nearsightedness”. I prefer to think of him as a quack. The other guy burnt off or froze every anomoly which was comforting in that he hurt me, so he showed me that he cared.

Now I have a gal who is supposed to be awesome. She only sees patients once a month. She is with Barnes, a "teaching" hospital so she send an intern in to talk to me, look me over and make initial recommendations. I have to strip. I have to turn slowly. I have to expose my deteriorating, flabby, hairy, old man body to this doctor. Then the boss comes in, looks at her notes and we start all over again. It is a fairly complete process. They gave me some ointments and creams for various maladies and then shaved something off my head which she said "might be a basal cell". It was like it was no big deal, very slow moving cancer. I left feeling like I had been well looked over and responsible about my bad genetics. A few days later she called me and said it is Basal Cell. I said "no big deal" and then she did her best to tell me it was serious and referred me to the surgeon. I called the surgeon immediately and she was so concerned that she set an appointment to consult with me.... a month from then.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basal_cell_carcinoma

So this week I go see the cutter. For your knowledge and care I have posted photos of a few of the things I have cut off my head and thrown into the yard. The message here is simple... wear a hat.