Thanks for the reassurance, I’ve had the biopsy but that was nothing compared to the pain of stones in my gallbladder that I had without painkillers for 5 hours. But believe kidney stones are worse.
Believe it or not, I had saliva gland stones in the left side of my neck/mouth. Made my neck swell like a balloon and the Doctor said “Suck on a sour patch kid!” Worked until it didn’t and that was pretty scary.
Had to have my throat slit, saliva gland removed from inside my mouth and in my neck. 10 days of antibiotics and the next day I blew up like a balloon again.
This time, they took a pint of pink puss out of my neck and put me in the Infectious Disease Quarantine. Because of the antibiotics, they couldn’t get anything to grow in the Petri dish, so I was on the strongest broad spectrum IV antibiotics they had for a week. Doctor told me they would collapse my veins, so to let him know if I get a burning sensation, so they could remove the shunt and put it somewhere else. That happened 4 times in a week and was more painful than the stones!
Had a cruise planned on the Sunday and the flight to Orlando for Port Canaveral was on Saturday. Family left for Orlando without me, but I caught up with them before the ship, with Dr’s orders to see the ships surgeon and get MedEvac’d to St Thomas if it blew up again. They had no idea what the infection was, but it had responded to the meds…so far, so they let me leave.
They sent a message to my ship after about 3-4 days telling me it was Strep that got into my neck cavity and ran wild. Apparently, it’s present in your throat all the time, but you have the immune system that suppresses it there. Once it got into my neck, it wasn’t recognized and went nuclear.
They were as surprised as I was, and we were all glad it wasn’t something that came back or was more serious for me and possibly even 3,000 of my closest buffet sharing friends!
It’s a miracle we can be made and it’s a miracle we make it to old age, because EVERYTHING is trying to kill you all the time and it’s only our natural defenses, lucky genes and dumb luck that allow us to live long lives.
Stay safe & healthy out there!