Grown and Worried

Sadly, this may be a repetitive theme on my blog but I have to say it again: I am surprised by the amount of fear associated with getting older. I know that many people associate youth with freedom and to an extent, I do too. At 20, I remember feeling really free speeding through New Orleans in Workman's SUV, him a little drunk and me with no fear that we could crash. At the same time, the last 20 years of my life have been stuffed with anxiety around money and success and goals and love and so on. For some reason, I believed I'd feel more fearless as I got older. I'm finding the opposite to be true. It seems like everyday presents something new to be fearful about. 

Tonight's fear de jure comes from anxiety around my mammogram. The mammogram itself was such a nightmare that I'm fearful about my results. At 41, shouldn't I be planning a girl's trip or doing something else that a middle-aged woman secure in her existence should be doing? I guess not because it's midnight and I'm unnerved, blogging in the dark about my mammogram. And if it weren't the mammogram it would be something else. I'm ready for the footloose and fancy free period of my life. I am all cried out and all worried out. Where is the grown woman happy and fun? Let's get to it already. PLEASE. 

That is all. 

Not The Gram pt. 2

I had my second mammogram today, and I should have known that it was going to be a doozy when I didn't have any anxiety around it. I had one last year, so I knew how the show was supposed to go. With that being said, I still ended up anxious, panicked, and in tears. 

The woman who did my mammogram last year had just left before I checked in, which was a shame because, even though I panicked last year as well, she was a nice island lady. She gave me a hug and told me to walk more. Needless to say, this new lady was not her. She asked me my weight, and I told her it's a lot, but I have lost a little because I am on a GLP-1. She then began to tell me this horrifying story about the people she has heard of who have taken GLP-1s and gone blind! 

"I heard about one guy who went completely blind," she said nonchalantly. "Then a patient told me she knew one lady that lost one of her eyes."

This comment woke my anxiety up immediately, and it only got worse as she roughly contorted my boobs into that machine. I didn't remember the last one hurting like this one did. It was like she was trying to get my whole collar in the shot. Then she pinched me with the machine, and I screamed! She apologized, but then proceeded to pull on my arm all weird. I eventually needed a break to sit down and cry hysterically, a little something I do when my anxiety hits the roof. 

Once the mammogram was finally over, she said that I would hear something in a week and I would get a letter in the mail. 

"I didn't get a letter last year," I said, suspiciously. 

"Yeah, they will send you a letter. Some older people need a letter and don't look online."

This statement made my anxiety feel like it was shooting out of the top of my head and through the ceiling! On top of this, the lady from last year looked at my images and said that they looked good. This lady didn't do that. I can't tell if it is because they didn't look good and she didn't want to be the one to tell me, or because she had no desire to put my mind at ease. 

After this mammogram, my body was sore like I had been in a fight. My aunt offered to take me to get food, but my shoulder locked up and felt so bad from when she pulled on my arm that she had to bring me home! As I lay here typing this, everything aches. I haven't even had time to go into full hysterical mode over my results. I am just lying here, trying not to make things worse. 

As horrible as this was, I have to remind you all that mammograms are super serious and part of the whole lady experience. You have to go get them done. Hopefully, next year, I won't have to undergo a beating to get one. 

Lady Lumps pt 1

The other day I woke up with a pain in my left boob, the problem boob.
I got up and went to the bathroom to investigate the situation to find that I had some type of lump above my areola.
I was not surprised. My left breast has given me nothing but problems since I was 13-years-old. Unusual sensitivity in my breast caused me to have to go to the doctor with my mom when I was in the 8th grade, only to find that I had a bacterial infection. I had to take pills, and since then, my left boob has been saggier and considerably more pancakey than my right one.
Now I know some of you all are reading this and holding your breath. I know what you are thinking: The Big BC. But I was not thinking that at the time. I was thinking, Great, more s&*t that I have to deal with. Keep in mind, I was also not completely awake. I rolled my eyes at my boob and went back to sleep.
Now, when I woke up for real, cancer was most definitely on my mind. I went back to the mirror to study the situation, rubbing the lump and to me, it didn't feel like cancer. I, of course, am going off of a breast cancer display that I felt on in college during some type of AKA sorority breast cancer workshop. A breast cancer survivor had a display of a set of breasts and told me to press down on both with two fingers and tell her when I felt something. It took a while before I felt something small and sharp deep in the display breast.
"That's the lump," she said with a stern, straight face. I catalogued that in my mind for a moment such as the one I didn't know I would be having 14 years later and went back to my dorm with my friends to get ready for a party.
My mind was racing a mile a minute. This bump on my breast hurt! I remembered a doctor in a Lifetime movie telling a patient in the movie that breast cancer didn't hurt. I exhaled a sigh of relief.
But then I panicked! That was a made-for-TV movie, not real life!
Then I remembered, when I went to Planned Parenthood for a pelvic exam, I was given a breast exam. The nurse said I had healthy breast tissue. Again, relief.
Then I panicked! That was six years ago!
But wait, I thought, I am only 34. Relief.
Then came the panic. I read an article not too long ago about how women younger than 40 and dudes are getting increased breast cancer diagnoses.
I decided to do what I do best: ignore the problem. However, that went out the window an hour later when the bump on my boop started leaking.