My first step down the road

When I turned 40, I did the thing we are all supposed to do: I made an appointment for a mammogram. I was warned by several doctors and technicians that there is a high probability that I will be called back due to an abnormality on my mammogram because it happens a lot when you are young and have dense breasts. So as much as I was prepared for it, you are never really prepared for it. I got a call back for an ultrasound because there was something unclear on my right breast. The doctor who was reading the ultrasound just couldn’t hide her fear and concern. It was written all over her face. This didn’t help me. She said that there were three spots of calcification on my right breast that looked suspicious and that they can either be just calcifications or something called DCIS. DCIS is Ductal Carcinoma In Situ, which is cells that are precancerous and live in the lining of your milk ducts. They can’t escape the milk ducts but need to be removed. She scheduled a biopsy for just 4 days later.

On March 22, I went, by myself, to the biopsy. Several people said they would go with me, but it seemed weird since all they would do is wait in a waiting room. It was the first time that this journey had interrupted our regular schedule and my kids noticed. Mom wasn’t there to get my daughter to school, and to hang out and do errands with my son. This would be the first of many times I would try to keep a schedule so as not to scare or cause anxiety in my kids.

There were two nurses/technicians, one solely to distract me, and one doctor who performed the biopsy. Most of it was automated, which was pretty cool. The started the procedure finding the DCIS spot they were biopsying, which meant they had to squish my boob to hold it in place, take a mammogram, then place the needle biopsy machine on my boob. There was numbing medicine then it took 6 needle biopsies. Every time the needle left my skin, it left more numbing medicine in there (thank goodness!) They double checked that the biopsy captured enough tissue. The doctor was not satisfied and wanted 6 more needle samples so they would have enough tissue to study. She double checked that I wasn’t feeling anything and did the procedure again. During this process, the nurse that was charged with distracting me was regaling me with stories of her teenagers and how fast they grow up. I was engaged but it was hard to not think of how scared I was becoming of missing out on things with my own kids. They are still so young and I hate missing anything. They do grow up so fast.

After the procedure was finished, I was given two small ice packs (laughingly small, really), and had instructions to put ice on it for the first day and wear a bra for 48 hours so that my boob wouldn’t move and cause the extremely tiny wound to open. Also, no lifting anything for two days and no swimming. It was never anything more than pretty sore. I took one Tylenol the night that the numbing drugs wore off.

At school pickup, everyone treated me with kid-gloves. The questions of how I was and how I was feeling was extremely overwhelming only because it was not a big deal of a procedure and I just wanted the whole thing to be over and done with.

Waiting is the hardest thing I have ever had to do. Harder than giving birth. Harder than saying goodbye to a loved one. Because it’s the unknown. I think I waited 5 days total, with two of those days being weekend days where, of course, no one would be calling me with test results. Every-single-time my Fitbit buzzed on my wrist with a text message (which was usually some friend asking me if I had heard anything yet) or calling me to tell me that my daughter bumped her head at school but was good enough to go back to class, my stomach would drop and all the air would leave my lungs.

Kind of made it hard to live.

Every time I ate food, I would have to run to the bathroom. Couldn’t keep food in my body from all the anxiety and stress. I guess I can admit that I took advantage of that and ate bags of chocolate and pints of ice cream. Its ok, it didn’t stick to anything.

These are the people I want to be healthy for.