Hidden Evils

I don't drink much. The last time I had two glasses of Baileys Irish Cream was during the cocktail hour at a New Jersey wedding in the 1980s, and I got a little tipsy. But tonight I'm on my second small glassful, and doing alright. I wanted to forget the pain, and the worry. Breasts can be lovely, but they can also harbor hidden evils, as it turns out.

Today I got a breast biopsy, several samples taken from my right breast behind the nipple--an area hard to access, I was told. Please excuse the raw frankness of this post. But when this breast biopsy business happens, you start looking at your body as a sum of its parts, not so much a beautiful whole.

I've held back from blogging about this, because I can be dramatic and anyway, I don't even know what the biopsy results are. And I don't want to jinx myself.

I went for a routine mammogram Dec. 12, then was called back for a follow-up ultrasound and films [Dec. 22].  Up in Maine right after Christmas, my doctor called to relay that it was advised that I get an ultrasound-guided needle biopsy. That maybe the lump was nothing, but they wanted to be sure. That it's small, under 2 cm., so even if it is something/malignant, they can just take it out. It hasn't spread.

I thanked her, then I flipped closed my cell phone and and cried alone in John's house in Maine, thinking of my mother dying from colon cancer at age 56, and leaving me behind, and how much I hated that, and how much I pray I won't ever have to leave Figgy behind when she is young. Then I made the appointment for today.

I'm too tired to write much. And my boob feels sore. It was terrifying. The thought of the needles in such a sensitive area [even after numbing], the punching-stapler sound of the several biopsy samples being taken.

H. drove me--he was so good. I went to the desk to sign in and show my insurance card. I looked behind me to my right at the waiting room chairs to see if he had sat down and then I thought, No, if I twirl around the other way, he will be at my side. And there he was, to my left, in his tan corduroy pants. I just hadn't seen him. He seemed smaller, because I was wearing heels. [Heels make me feel better; I had on a new purple sweater skirt, too. On sale. ] And he was quieter, because this was serious. But he was smiling. He was so good, like some kind of benevolent magic force.

I was OK through the procedure, though clutching the edge of the bed. It was really hard to visualize the ocean or Cape Cod with all of that going on, even though the doctor and her assistant were gracious and capable. I almost fainted afterward when you have to sit up and get the post-op instructions--I think it was the fear of it all kicking in, the seeing the bandage, the getting the ice pack. A nurse came and checked my BP and gave me some juice.

Now I wait for the results. I hope and pray it's fine. I thank you for listening. And I'm not writing this for pity, just for facts, and feelings, and memories, and details, so I can look back and remember. So Figgy can look back and remember if she ever has to face a tricky test like this. [Figgy, it's a major pain in the boob, but as your mother, I say, Just Do It. What's the alternative?]

Good night.

TCOY

1. Nothin' really, except boob biopsy to protect my future.
2. Salon blowout, which I had scheduled last week to save five bucks.