Cervical Smears

Just to remind you, October is Cancer Awareness Month.

As part of the rebuilding of Joanna Cake, I decided to get my physical health checked up, as well as continuing to work on my mental attitude with the Counsellor.

I booked my cervical smear. It is three years since my last one and, in that time, Ruf's semen has been spurted against my cervix on many occasions. According to Wikipaedia, a human papillomavirus (HPV) is a papillomavirus that infects the epidermis and mucous membranes of humans. HPV can lead to cancers of the cervix, vulva, vagina, and anus in women. In men, it can lead to cancers of the anus and penis. Carriers and sufferers can be asymptomatic and genital warts seems to be the only obvious sign of a problem but this does not occur in all cases.

We have to remember that cervical cancer is caused by only one or two types of the virus, hence the current decision in the UK to vaccinate young women aged between 13 and 18, even those who have already had sexual intercourse, in the hope that they have so far not been exposed to either strain.

There has been a great furore in the British press recently because a young girl died a few hours after being given the vaccine. It later transpired that she had other health problems which were actually the cause of her death, but a great deal of bad publicity was given to this unfortunate event, to the detriment of the cervical cancer vaccination programme.

From the fact that all my smear tests have been normal, clearly the father of my children was not a carrier and, whilst Ruf had a full sexual health check before we became physically involved, as far as I am aware, this virus is not something that they check for in men as part of that test. So, three years on, with no apparent symptoms, I had my PAP test and kept my fingers crossed.

In the past, my cervical smears were always done at round day 17 of my cycle - as late as possible in the time parameters so that ovulation could be sure to have occurred. Without the sticky residue that accompanies this, there were repeated callbacks because of insufficient cells on the slide. Of course, at my time of life, my periods are few and far between. I have had a blood test to check my FSH levels and been told that the chances of my ovulating are very small indeed due to the high level of the reading. However, the test parameters were for samples taken on day 3-5 of a cycle and this was not a quantifiable date when I hadn't had a day 1 for some months. I booked the smear and the following day my period decided to come back from its holidays, so I had to rearrange it all.

The much-publicised death of Jade Goody from cervical cancer at the age of 28 has also seen a huge increase in the take-up of tests offered to older women on the NHS and, therefore, the results are taking six weeks or more to come through because of the backlog.

However, what has become known as the 'Jade Goody effect' has also caused a lot of young woman under 25 to request a cervical smear but this is not currently available to them on the basis that statistics show the risk to these women is not so great as for those over 25, which seems very wrong since there are still women dying in their 20s as a result of this disease going undetected, Ms Goody being a very prominent example.

In the event, for me, the smear itself went smoothly and enough cells were collected to provide an adequate sample for testing, although I did not have another period for the next four months so could not have ovulated in the required timeframe.

Fortunately, after six weeks, the results came through clear, but they did advise me that there was candida present and so I was sent a prescription for a Canesten pessary.

I have not used the treatment because I have decided to investigate this invasion further. My repeated bouts of thrush and cystitis, combined with various other symptoms have led me to believe that I might have a yeast intolerance which is now leaching out through my intestines into other parts of my body. I have found a diet that precludes yeast and other fungi, plus their food source: sugar and processed wheat flour. I am also taking various herbal preparations to destroy the candida bacteria along with probiotics to restore the balance of good and bad within my gut.

More on this at a later date.