Happy Birthday! Please Place Boob Here ......

Hey Everyone!

A week and a bit ago, I had a birthday. I turned 37. I'm not one of these women who lies about her age. My true eye and/or hair colour sure ... but not my age ;-)

It was an interesting birthday this year .... I had my very first mammogram! Yeah. Happy Birthday to me! lol

I've heard the mammogram horror stories for years. I was not looking forward to this experience. But ... ya gotta do what ya gotta do. And this was something I had to do .

Generally women don't get a mammogram until they hit 40. In Nov I developed a slight pain in my left breast. Hmmm ... that's new. I try not to run to the doc for every little ache and pain, but when it was still there and consistent by the end of Dec, coupled with the fact that breast cancer runs in my family, I called my doc, and the appointment was made for the mammo. Scheduled for a month later, on Jan, 31st. Happy Birthday to me LOL.

Over the course of the next month, I told a few friends about my upcoming appointment. I was nervous. About the mammo itself, and of course the results. How many times had I read about how painful this particular procedure is? How many women had I heard say the word "Mammogram" with utter dread in their voices?

Then, one of the girls told about the 'ball bearings!". Yeah. Let's just up the nervous factor a notch shall we? Now I had visions of not only being placed in a vice grip and squeezed within an inch of certain deformity, but also having giant silver ball bearings duct taped onto me at the same time! I could see it now ... my boob was going to be squeezed to look like a flat fish, with one of those little cherry tomatoes in it's mouth ... but it would be silver! WAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH

The closer it got to Jan 31st, the more I reminded myself ... You can handle the pain! When it starts to hurt just repeat to yourself "I had two kids with no drugs! I had two kids with no drugs!"

The 'Big Day' arrives and off I to the hospital I go. Of course there's a HUGE lineup going down the street and around the corner completely blocking my way TO the hospital, so I have to park FAR away ... at a meter, and of course not expecting to have to park at a meter I have no change. UGH! Plug in what I have, hope my time doesn't run out before I get back, and run the couple of blocks to the hospital. When I finally get up to the 3rd floor, worried about the fact I'm about 7 min late, I get off the elevator to a PACKED waiting room. I take my number ... they're on 184 ... I'm #009. Guess I didn't have to worry about being late LOL.

Once I'm through registration and into the lovely fashion attire provided by the hospital, I'm quickly called into .... da da da da .... 'The Room" !!!!

OK ... here we go ... you can do this!

After a couple of minutes of idle chit chat with the tech, I tell her why I'm there, she tells me what to expect, and then brings out .... the Ball Bearings! I almost laughed out loud, and I'm sure she must have been wondering what I was grinning foolishly about :-) They were tiny little gold beads. Almost like a little gold stud earring :-) Once she had them on there with a small piece of tape (no duct tape!), I almost couldn't suppress the urge to ask "Do you have a tassel?" lol

Then we walked over to the vice grip.



I have no idea what the technical term is for this machine of torture, nor do I care to know, to me, it's simply the vice grip. I'm not going to go into detail about the whole procedure, suffice it to say ... it's pretty much 'please place boob here', you're squeezed ... and it hurts!!! HOLY CRAP it hurts!!! When it got really bad, I reminded myself 'two kids no drugs! two kids no drugs!" and it was over. Then, it was on to the other side. And yup, HOLY CRAP it hurt over there too!

But then it was over. And all in all I guess it wasn't REALLY as bad as I thought it was going to be. Damn it hurt! But only for a minute. If you're really interested in reading more about the mammography procedure, you can do so here:

http://www.radiologyinfo.org/en/info.cfm?pg=mammo&bhcp=1

http://info.cancer.ca/E/CCE/cceexplorer.asp?tocid=10

http://www.stjohnsmercy.org/healthinfo/test/gyn/TP121.asp


On the bright side, I got back to my vehicle and my time was expired, but no ticket :-) YES! There is a parking meter god!

I got my results back a few days later. All clear. YES! It's believed the pain is being caused by a nerve that was severed during one of the lung surgeries. Why am I being bothered by it now? Cause I just had my freakin' 37th, birthday, I'm gettin' old and fallin' apart that's why! LOL

I still have to meet with my doc for a follow up, but as long as the pain doesn't get any worse, and doesn't cause any other issues, I won't do anything further about it. Now that I know it's not being caused by anything related to breast cancer, I can live with it.

The day got much better after that :-) I took the boys out for dinner to a nice 'family restaurant' that we hadn't tried yet, and they had GREAT food and atmosphere! Then when we got home, the ex showed up with a cake and card from himself and the boys. On the cake ... "29 4 Ever!" LOL ... OK! :-)

Hmmmm .... maybe I'll just try sky diving for next year's birthday ... but still wear the beads ;-p

Have a good week all!

K.