DEAR THYROID, I MISS YOU AND I'M SORRY

I feel bad, like it's all my fault, you know, that you had to leave. Back when I was in Jr. High and High School I virtually pushed you over the edge with all that dieting, bingeing and purging. I wished that I could eat all that I wanted and still loose weight. I know now what I didn't know then, that I was growing into a woman and that curves are normal, even if they are accompanied by all those pesky and uncomfortable sexual feelings.

I know you tried to warn me that you were enlarged, begging me to take better care of us, but I didn't know you even existed then and no one who did took you seriously. I know that by the time I was pregnant at 23 you were only doing what you figured I would want, enabling me to eat as much as I wanted and still lose weight. That was the first time in my life when gaining weight was welcome. Honestly, it was liberating. I needed that, a time in my life when the pressure to lose weight was off. By the time I had nursed my first daughter for one month, I weighed less than I had in years, and I felt beautiful. I was able to eat and eat healthy foods and continue to lose weight. You know I would have kept things like that indefinitely, your doing all the work.

So, I can hardly blame you for swelling up, bleeding. I put you through three more pregnancies and plenty of drugs and alcohol, still with nary a thought... until it was too late. I thought a goiter was an old lady disease and I was scared when my midwife told me you were sick. I'd never even been to a doctor for a physical, even in the year I had insurance through my work and there were all those ten day fasts; I simply did not know.

And then, as soon as we met, you had to leave. You gave me quite a scare. You were so big and there were the fears we had cancer. They said I could nuke you, and I thought that was no way to live a life, and decided to have you extracted. There is a small bit of you still here, a withered portion damaged by our raging bits. Sometimes I like to think that it's just enough that you might miraculously grow back, but every year I discover no such thing has occurred and I take that pill every. morning. for. the. rest. of. my. life.

Sometimes I fear that some sort of natural disaster will have me scouring pastures for some innocent animal whose thyroid I must eat to survive, and I am humbled by my acquiescence a consumeristic society that makes a CVS or Walgreens at every corner a comforting sight. I just wanted to tell you that I am sorry for all those years I took you for granted. I know that with our family history we were bound to part eventually, but more love on my part may have postponed our premature parting. I can say simply didn't know, but wonder if that would have been enough anyway. I miss you.