tired and listless

Boobgate : An update

So I was recalled for a further echogram following this summer’s lumpy discovery.

I was pretty chipper as I got on the bus to the hospital - remember how easy the last one had been? And the consultant had been so certain that it was a cyst, it was practically text book.

I was running late - I’d got the timing a bit wrong for getting the bus and ended up running round to the maternity unit which is behind the main hospital. Luckily they too were running late (not literally and sweatily, like me) and I hadn’t missed out on my boob-stravaganza.

This time I felt pretty confident as the nurse gave me instructions to take off my top and lie on the bed. The machine was just the same, the screen showed my name and date of birth.

The radiologist came into the room, not the same one as last time, an older guy with a beard. How are you? He said cheerfully. Well, I’m lying half naked on a hospital bed with a stranger just about to probe an alien lump in my boob, how do you think? I thought.

He did the gel/echogram thing, quickly and thoroughly. Nothing to report on the right side and then, bingo, there it is. Our friend. The lump.

How long have you had it? How old are you? Is it painful? He asks in quick succession. It’s okay though, I say, it’s a cyst.

No, no. Not a cyst. He says. I can tell from the screen, this is solid.

I scrabble about for Spanish lump related vocabulary, my mind going completely blank. It isn’t dangerous is it? I end up saying. He looks at me kindly and says something I don’t understand. Pinchar.

Pinchar is a word I associate with a good night out. Pinchar discos is to play records or DJ. What in the world has that got to do with boobs?

The nurse arrived with a tray and they set to work fiddling about with something out of my sight. The radiologist then turned to me with the longest scariest needle I’ve ever seen. It seemed that pinchar also means skewer you into a boob kebab.

It didn’t take long to figure out that they wanted to know more about the nature of the solid lump. The biopsy was pretty painful and seemed to last a long time. He was guiding the needle via the echogram and so I had a really weird view of the whole thing on screen in front of me.

Afterwards they patched me up and said the consultant would have results in a few days. And then I went home and cried.

The three days wait for the results was more agony than needleboob. I couldn’t accept comfort hugs as I was so sore and bruised. I couldn’t concentrate at work. I avidly googled everything I could find under “solid lump boob”. (Not ever a good idea)

The results came on Friday, a really beautiful hot day. I was sitting in the plaza near work having a coffee and my phone rang. It was Tim and I knew that he would have spoken to the consultant (his Spanish being better than mine) and was now going to tell me…well, what my fate was.

I answered the phone and he blurted out, You’re fine, everything is fine. It was true what people say about weight lifting off your shoulders, at that good news I truly felt lighter. Better.

The final consultation that I had, post-results, is that I have a fibroadenoma or ‘breast mouse’ (eek eek!) They are benign tumours, not cancerous or pre-cancerous or any indication that you are more likely to get cancer. They are stimulated by hormones and come and go. I can opt to leave it alone or for surgical removal.

At the moment I’m going to leave it. I’ve got another echogram booked in a years time and we’ll take it from there.

Oh hai new Keith Haring x Obey shirt.

Seeing in 2013 the right way. In a hot ass tee.

5. A photo from the start of the year.