The day I have my mammogram, Tarik and I are packing the moving truck. We’ve been planning a move to the West Coast for some time and my finding this lump is exceptionally bad timing – as if there’s ever a good time. I’ve never had a mammogram before, but I’m not too nervous about it. Afterall, I don’t have a family history of breast cancer and I’m trying to convince myself that this lump is just a cyst, something that might need attention but could be excised out like the ganglion cyst on my wrist or the basal cell carcinoma on my forehead several years earlier.
Did you know?
- Only 7-10% of people with breast cancer have a genetic link (I always thought it was way higher)
Sweaty, in leggings and a sports bra, I walk into the radiologist’s office, smiling and ready for what will be my first – and, as I’ll soon find out, my last – mammogram. While I’m not familiar with the mammogram process, I am very familiar with undressing at doctor’s offices, as most women are. I change into my blue robe, snap a picture in the mirror to send to my sisters (#mammoselfie) and plop down in the waiting room with a book. The lovely mammo tech gently calls my name and leads me to the small, sterile room. I start asking questions, as I tend to do, about the process. She quickly realizes that I’m a mammogram virgin, so she does what so many supportive women in these situations do – she begins to softly describe the process in detail.
#mammoselfie
I find myself interested in her, in her life, in what led her to build a career where, for 8 hours a day, she’s in a small, sterile room with no windows, with strangers, with women who, I’m guessing, are often terrified. So, I ask her “How did you find yourself here?” She explains that much of her career was spent doing x-rays but that a few years ago, a friend of hers was diagnosed with breast cancer, and that experience led her to this job. In that moment I can’t help but wonder: What if I am “that friend” she’s speaking about, the one diagnosed with breast cancer? What if, without knowing it yet, I’m about to become someone’s ‘that friend’? Still, it seems crazy. She senses she’s lost me and calls my name to resuscitate my attention. She says we’re ready to start. She lifts my left breast into the machine, but first must lower it significantly. I’m 5’ 1” and the woman before me must have been at least 6” taller. My newfound friend, the mammo tech, explains she’ll take several pictures of the left breast at multiple angles before switching over to the right breast, then back to the left once more.
As my breast rests between the two clear plastic plates, the mammogram machine hums like a quiet giant, its arm steady and unyielding, pressing gently but firmly. The plates are cool against my skin, and I can’t help but think about these glass-like hands holding a secret beneath the surface – a delicate truth I have yet to uncover. I stand there wondering, knowing that the mammo tech on the other side of the screen probably already knows. It’s a strange, yet in a way calm, dance – clinical but intimate – between my flesh and the plastic, between me and the tech, transparency and tension – all in the pursuit of one answer. Is it cancer?
While reviewing the images her voice remains calm and unaffected, as if she’s practiced this in the mirror countless times. She tells me the radiologist will likely want to do an ultrasound. My mind immediately races, and I think to myself: Well, that wasn’t part of the original plan. She sees something she’s not telling me. How hard this must be for her. I wonder about the burden she must carry, knowing what she sees on the screen is still only a fear within reach, not yet a reality for the patient; for me. I want to give her a hug. And I do.
She leads me to the next room for the ultrasound. I’ve had many, many ultrasounds, though up until now they’ve typically been further south – and much more invasive. That said, I know how this goes. They squeeze cold gel on the wand. They image. They measure. They take pictures. They say nothing. I wait.
This process could really use some revision.
I’ve somehow managed to stay quite calm up to this point. I keep telling myself it’s just a cyst, even though I don’t have the confidence to say that out loud and in the back of my mind, I’m scared. I wait for the radiologist to read the mammogram and the ultrasound. I know better than to get dressed – doctors always want to conduct an examination after imaging. This time was no different.
Well, initially no different. The radiologist approaches me in the room and by the look on her face I can tell something is off. It isn’t a cyst. She asks if she could do an exam to which I reply “of course”. Does anyone say no at this point? It isn’t that the exam itself is any different, but it’s extremely fast. She doesn’t need to do the physical exam; she already knows. Maybe she’s required to follow this protocol. Maybe she’s delaying the inevitable. She’s young, and I wonder how many times – or how few – she’s had to deliver news like this. Regardless, it’s quick, but not without pain.
I sit up and wrap the gown around my chest, now heavy with the weight of the news I’m not ready to hear. Heavy with cancer. Even as she tries to mask it with professionalism, I can see the burden in her eyes. She isn’t just delivering news – she’s about to shift to my entire world.
As she finishes the exam and begins to speak, the room somehow feels smaller, the air thicker. I can feel the weight of her words before she says them. “I do not have good news. I see a mass. There’s a 50-75% chance it’s cancer. You need a biopsy. Soon.” I force myself to breathe, to stay present in the moment, but the gravity of her words is suffocating and relentless. The room feels impossibly small, the air thick with the weight of her words. Tarik and I have plans to begin our drive across the country tomorrow. “How soon?” I ask. “Within the next week or two; I wouldn’t wait longer than that” she responds with confidence.
I can barely process the reality that this might be a defining moment in my life. Yet, here I am, wondering how quickly this biopsy needs to happen, knowing full well that my plans to move across the country have suddenly been overshadowed by something far more urgent.
The radiologist asks if I have any questions. I have a lot. I ask none. I get dressed and I leave. My world had just been shifted beneath me, but I have a moving truck to pack and a family to move across the country. The biopsy will wait until the following week.