I have a number of posts in the making, but I haven't completed anything in a while so I thought in the midst of my mess I'd sit down and write a blog post for y'all. The last post I did was a full week update, and I hate posting multiple updates in a row, but this is a medical update rather than a full life update.
For those of you who follow me on Instagram, I posted this past week a mini explanation for my medical condition at the moment. For those of you who don't know, I'm here to post the full rundown.
About seven months ago, my voice started giving out on me. I would be in the middle of talking and it would just cut out mid-sentence. At first it just sounded like awkward voice cracks here and there, but then it got to a point where I couldn't even sing stuff within my range without my voice cracking. And then a few weeks later, I would be talking at normal volume and then all of the sudden I would lose my voice. It made no sense.
In December, I was finally able to make this appointment in February with a specialist to get a procedure done to see what was wrong. When the day finally came for my appointment, I went in and the doctor numbed my nose and throat and stuck a camera down my nose and into my vocal chords. He told me after the procedure that everything looked normal and that I likely just had vocal strain. He told me what I already knew (meaning no yelling or whispering and to drink more tea... the basics...) and I went home with nothing to do because there wasn't anything they saw so they couldn't prescribe me anything.
Since then, my voice hadn't gotten much better, but it also hadn't gotten any worse, so when there'd be a voice crack or a moment where my voice would suddenly disappear, I just blamed it on the vocal strain. About two weeks ago though, I was in my shower and I began coughing up blood. I called my mom into the bathroom to come and see the nickel-sized drops of blood floating in the water below me. The next day my mom took me to regular doctor to figure out what was up. I got tested for tuberculosis and I had my lungs x-rayed and was told to come back three days later for my results.
When my mom and I went back on Friday, all of the tests had come back negative. I was told I was fine. But that was obviously false. My regular doctor came out with the paperwork from my specialist's appointment from February so that we could read over it and check if this whole predicament was something wrong with my throat. As I read through the medical records, I found something. Like the specialist had said, I'd seemed to be fine, but it said in the next portion of my paperwork that I was supposed to have been treated for vocal nodules, more commonly known as nodes. This was terrifying considering the doctor hadn't said anything to me, so my mom and I called their office as soon as we had left my regular doctor's office. We had to schedule another appointment and redo the procedure with another doctor to confirm whether or not I had nodes.
Last week on Tuesday my mom and I went in for the appointment to redo the procedure. Everything was done just the same, and exactly like February's appointment, I was told that I was fine. The new specialist said that he could put me on a new set of medication or prescribe me some meds so that we could do a trial and error to figure out what was wrong, but me, my family, and my normal doctor weren't super keen on that idea. So when we left, I felt pretty dejected because no doctor so far has been able to figure out what's wrong with me.
As for right now though, I'm still coughing up blood on and off and even talking at a normal volume feels like I'm straining my voice, so I'm supposed to be on vocal rest. Additionally, I'm waiting for a lung specialist appointment and I have to go in soon to get my blood tested.
It's just a massive bummer because most days, I'll talk at a low volume to my friends, but a lot less that I usually do. Recently though, I've had to go on full vocal rest. That means no talking, singing, whispering, yelling, etc. To be honest, this has been super difficult because I talk so much and I sing everyday and I'm unable to do either of those.
Tonight we have our very last choir concert and I'm lip-syncing. Also, I'm unable to audition for my school's theater program right now because I don't have a voice. And I have no idea how long this will last for. It's been really hard and I don't want to lie about that. I will say though that I think that God's definitely working through the pain.
My voice is something that I totally put my value and worth in, and it is something that I use to describe myself. In the Bible though, it says that the only descriptions of ourselves should be children of Christ. I often lose sight of that because I get so caught up in the things that our world provides. I am the type of person who wants to control everything because I think that my way and my ideas are going to be greater. That's totally false though because God's plan is the real way. I think that not being able to speak right now is just a reminder to give God control and trust him because his plans for me will always be better than mine.
So that's all my news and wisdom for today.
Much Love,
Delaney Miller