We often hear about load shedding since the beginning of the pandemic, but its effects remain abstract. As hospitals face a critical lack of resources, The duty decided to put words and faces to statistics. Today, the story of Hyacinth.
Jacinthe Laporte, 45, has a small bump in her neck. She is barely visible to ordinary mortals, but Jacinthe thinks only of herself.
It’s a mass on his thyroid gland. Goiter disease runs in her family and she herself underwent emergency surgery at age 17 for a tumor that turned out to be benign.
What about this time? The endocrinologist she consulted argued that there is a 33% chance that it is cancerous. A significant risk but insufficient for his surgery to be considered a priority. Cancers detected must be treated first. However, in his case, the operation plays both the role of screening and that of treatment.
“There’s no way to know if it’s cancerous without going to the coverslip,” she says.
The little bump appeared in 2019. In November, she was then told that she would have surgery within six months. And the pandemic arrived, with further six-month postponements.
“I have to be ready a little bit all the time, with four children to manage, without knowing when it will be,” she says on the phone while we hear behind her daughter in full cello practice.
What can be prepared
Every six months, she sees her surgeon again, who tells her that he is not available to operate on her. Failing this, he performs a new biopsy to measure the progression of the mass. “Once in a while, it doesn’t get worse. It’s getting bigger but it’s not improving, so there’s nothing to reassure. »
To (re)read: our series The faces of load shedding
This is not nothing for Jacinthe, who is prone to anxiety. “It’s the anxiety that is more and more difficult to manage,” she points out.
“When the daughter of actors Violette Chauveau and Normand Chouinard died last year, she was awaiting surgery. It broke my heart so much! It shocked me, I started shaking. »
In order to manage her stress, Jacinthe decided to intervene on what she controls in her life. After fifteen years of union, she and her spouse got married. They acquired her dream house, she completed an old book project. Then she wrote her will, chose and bought her lot at the cemetery. “I hate not being ready and I can prepare for that. »
If you would like to tell us a story about the consequences of load shedding, write to our journalists Isabelle Porter and Jessica Nadeau: [email protected] and [email protected]