I Have a Lump Pt. 2
I finally got to see Dr. Fountain-of-Youth-Face about the strange yet painless lump on my back rib. Fortunatley, it’s not on my rib. It’s in my skin. The diagnosis was a sebaceous cyst (also called epidermoid cysts). There was a fun little explanation to go with that.
WARNING: The Following is Kinda Gross
One of the doo-hickeys that secretes normal body oil is clogged up for some reason. But the sebaceous gland is still producing oil at a normal rate, even though it can’t get onto the skin where it belongs. So, it’s producing a backwash (his term) under the skin, which is generally harmless.
And then he added, “The body oil turns into stuff that looks like the white filling in cheesecake.”
What is it with doctors and comparing body problems to food? First, I got turned off of raisins for life after getting my first ear-cleaning due to psoriasis narrowing my ear canals, and now I’m right off cheesecake. Not that I can afford cheesecake, anyway, but that’s not the point.
So, What Happens Now?
The doctor gave me two options about what to do about my cheesecake cyst. First was to leave it alone and bother with it only if it starts bothering me. Second, to get it surgically removed in possibly an out-paitent procedure. Guess which option I chose?
That’s right — I voted for the first option. Now, what could happen if I left it alone? There are four possibilities:
- The lump will go away on it’s own
- The lump will turn into a boil and need lancing to remove cheesecake-like filing
- I’ll have the lump all of my life and will die with it (which will make my corpse more easy to identify)
- It’ll get infected and then I’ll need it surgically removed.
Isn’t going to the doctor fun?
March 31st, 2009 at 2:58 pm
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