SkincareMT – Julie Fredrickson

Day 1654 and Post-Operative Exhaustion

As I slowly walked myself out of surgery yesterday, I thought to myself “I actually feel much better!” And I genuinely did.

If you have a gentle stomach, maybe stop reading here. I’m fine. I’m on my way to well. And this will be graphic.

I do feel dramatically better having had the “slouching towards septic” abscess drained of infection as well as removal of the initial pearl style irritant (a 3mm deep entirely horizontal hair growing not up but sideways like an underground fracking tube).

I appreciated having the walls of the abscess pulled out bit by bit in a delicate curettage by my silk sundress clad physician. It was all a success.

But post operative care is hard? I’m a mess. I’m exhausted, loopy, and the hotel’s guest services are concerned enough that they are doing me such kindnesses like sending up tea and maxipads. Turkish hospitality comes from a place of genuine kindness and I need that right now.

It’s been a long journey of stupid to end up in Istanbul to get a smart fix. Going from a squishy movable almond sized lump without any pain six weeks ago to a hard plum sized lump was disconcerting enough. Especially having done my damned preventive care visits with the useless Dr Oetkin in Montana.

Have had two days of prodding, poking, squeezing, moving and ultrasounding done in the Mediterranean, I was swollen, feverish, and all hurt to the touch. I was afraid.

How did I get here? How had my next generation IL-17 managed to cause me so many negative side effects even as I was doing better across all biometrics and across quality of life metrics?

No wonder the doctor in Istanbul was so concerned. All the previous doctors had done was make my situation worse though inaction and delay m, and then the action they took made it worse.

Now I have recovery ahead of me. Last night as I went to pee, I realized why they had padded the upper areas of my underwear with maxi pads. I’ve got no discharge downstairs but on the upper bikini area there was no such luck.

I only needed one stitch to close up thanks to the careful work of the doctor, but a lot of goo came out during the surgery drainage and I was warned there was still more to come, though it would taper off.

I gently washed the area with a cloth and antiseptic soap before application of antibiotic cream (my third type of antibiotic). I gasped as I saw the first lightly red sticky watery fluid gush out rapidly around the stitch. It was so fast and there was so damn much. Bodies are disgusting what else can be said?

I mopped up with a clean moist towel and applied a thick layer of antibiotic cream, but I had learned the deflation of the abscess wasn’t quite done. The swelling, I was told, would take a week or more to full abate.

I’ll be sleeping this off for the day but if you are in Montana with an autoimmune disease and need a dermatologist I’d recommend you stay away from Dr. Tara Oetken at SkincareMT. Without her hasty heuristics and lack of conviction I wouldn’t be in this mess.

Day 1649 and Physician Heal Thyself

I’ve been having some side effects from my new biologic injection Bimzelx. Whenever I travel, I do a spate of doctors appointments before I leave so I can be adequately prepared for likely scenarios. Be prepared is my motto.

I had gone to a dermatologist a month ago to check on a cyst or swollen lymph node in an awkward spot. It’s on my pubic bikini area so I’ve been playing hot potato with dermatologists versus gynecologists.

The dermatologist appointment was so horrifying I’d recommend you stay away from Dr. Tara Oetken at SkincareMT as it was such a degrading and frankly useless experience. I do fully endorse their cosmetic practice and Nurse Addison.

I ended up at the dermatologist as the gynos were like “uhhh it’s on the outside and involves no reproductive organs so you need a dermatologist” and then dermatologist was a bit “its close to your vagina ewwww icky scary did you go to the gyno?”

Yes dear that’s how I got sent to you, this ain’t no picnic for me either.

I was embarrassed but the cyst/enflamed lymph node had been unchanging for a few months (not growing or differing in texture but malleable & squishy). So I checked in, was mostly embarrassed, got no direction that helped and left feeling degraded.

Given my previous issues with meiborn gland infections on my eyelids, I’d been instructed to keep a close eye any side effects common like folliculitis that is common Bimzelx. This was clearly a complex side effect that I’d had multiple issues with all year. The next step was imaging but I could get zero sense in the very short visit of whether or not the doctor felt it was warranted. “It’s up to you” sounds nice until you want a doctor to give you their professional advice.

Well now I’m in a foreign country and the almond sized squishy bit has ballooned in just four or five short days to thrice or quadruple its size, it’s now quite firm and not easy to move around or squish and I’ve got to do the same dance all over with doctors ago don’t speak English.

Thankfully I have artificial intelligence and an interpreter. I’ll get the imaging ultrasound done (AI says get it done immediately based on the differential it did) and then we can see if it’s a cyst or a lymph node that needs an I&D. I started antibiotics 3 days into this ballooning and it has done little to fix it so let’s find out. Hopefully I don’t need someone lancing and squeezing out stuff in a foreign country. But if I do need that I may pop a flight to Istanbul for that.