After spending a week in San Diego getting everything moved into our new place – and making an unexpected detour to the ER because Tarik decided to take a little jaunt around the U-Haul on Dakota’s broken scooter and instead broke his arm – I flew back to North Carolina to tie up loose ends before making the west coast my permanent home. The girls were still with my parents, thoroughly enjoying life where every day is a “Yes Day” with Katy and Pop. But even they knew that kind of fun couldn’t last forever. Someone has to say no eventually.
I landed on a Saturday. My biopsy was scheduled for Monday.
My older sister, Erin, insisted on taking me to the appointment. It’s a weird dynamic – grappling with the looming shadow of a cancer diagnosis and trying to manage your own fear while protecting your loved ones from it. Up until this point, I had handled all my medical appointments solo. A part of me liked it that way – it gave me time to process everything before sharing the hard truths with anyone else. But Erin wasn’t having it. Older sisters have a way of asserting their plans as law. She showed up at my door with a hot peppermint mocha in hand (my not-so-secret addiction) and whisked me off to the appointment.
This was all unchartered territory for me. New office, new procedure – my only other biopsy experience had been a couple of years earlier, when a basal cell carcinoma was removed from my forehead. That, at least, hadn’t involved any of the high-stakes drama.
Erin and I sat in the waiting room, chatting and cracking jokes, even about the possibility of getting my boobs whacked off, because what else are you supposed to do while waiting for the nurse to call your name? Spiral into despair? Laughing felt like the better option. Afterall, if you’re not laughing, you’re probably not doing it right (and by “it”, I mean literally anything). When my name was finally called, the nurse explained the procedure. This would involve a tissue biopsy and the placement of a breast tissue tracker, which is a tiny titanium clip they’d leave behind as a marker. This was news to me – no one had mentioned I’d be taking home a souvenir.
The radiologist arrived, and just like that, the procedure came and went. It was quick. Erin barely had time to finish scrolling Instagram before I was walking out. Now I just had to wait 48-72 hours to find out whether I had breast cancer. Forty-eight hours can feel like an eternity when you’re stuck in limbo, waiting for news that could turn your world upside down. But at that moment, at least, I felt okay. I had my sister, my coffee, and the ridiculous comfort of knowing we’d laughed our way through a biopsy.
By the way, it didn’t take 72 hours to get the results. It didn’t even take 48. The call came the next day.
biopsy aftermath