One of the most impressive things through my journey so far has been the medical staff and their level of competency. I have an entire new appreciation for the angels in this field. When I first boarded this roller coaster called Cancer, I reached out to a dear, dear friend of mine (you all may know her as Silver Fox Cindy :). Silver Fox Cindy fought this breast cancer battle years ago. I lived in New Jersey at the time and, can I just say, she was the Orginal Gangsta of Conquering Cancer! While I am certain it was challenging for her, she wore her million dollar smile every single time I saw her. So of course I consulted her from the beginning of all of this and she told me something that has stuck with me. I was being a sissy about all the needles they were poking in me and procedures I had to undergo and she told me, "Les, this is a complex diagnosis, each procedure they do is a piece to the very complex puzzle. Let them do their thing so that they get all the pieces in place and can see the illustration of your treatment plan". Damn that was good advice. Thank you Silver Fox Cindy, love you so much!
The Mammogram
I told you guys about how Alex kissed my hand when they called me back for the mammogram, and how I didn't show up for my regulary scheduled mammo that should have taken place in January this year. I'm still kicking myself for that...nonetheless, there I was. 40 and a half years young, scared as shit, not prepared for how friggin cold it is back there, undressed from the waste up, wearing the oh-so-unflattering hospital gown, sititng in a waiting area with 4 other women waiting for their mammos or whatever procedure they were having. A couple of them didn't have hair, one looked as terrified as I was and one was so chill, just popping her gum and reading a magazine. We all got called to our individual procedures and went about our lives, but there was something in that waiting area. There was a silent bond, we were all women doing something to care for our bodies. There was something empowering about it and oddly, these strangers made me feel a little more comfortable. When I walked into the mammogram room I was surprised by how large the device is that they use is. I mean, it's big and kind of intimidating, it's the ultimate boob squisher and that sucker squishes the hell out of boobs!
My mammographer was real cool and comforting, she told me that she would take a few images, run them over to the interpreter and that I would have some results that day. She takes me over to the machine, takes one of my arms out of the gown and straight up grabs my boob LOL. Didn't even buy me a drink first haha, kidding of course. But yea, she grabs my breast, places in on the platform and starts lowering the glass part. She does a great job explaining everything that she's doing to me, and she does warn me that it might be a little uncomfortable. And let me tell you, they squish the breast pretty flat, but they have to! It's not pleasant but it's not unbearable by any means. She was so good at positioning my arms and leaning my body at the right angle, rotating my shoulders, she was so good at her job. She asks me to take a breath in and hold it while she takes the photo, then does the same on the other breast. Once she got the images she wanted she runs them over to the interpreter, (I still picture the interpreter as that little guy behind the big voice on The Wizard of Oz), but she doesn't come back with results. She comes back and tells me that they are going to send me for an ultrasound to "get a better look". I swear I knew right then that it was bad, I didn't know that it was cancer but I knew it was something. Her whole tone of voice changed, it's like I went from a 40 year old woman to a 5 year old child. I knew then that I was in trouble.
The Ultrasound
The mammographer takes me back to the waiting area, I was alone in there this time, no strangers to silently bond with. Just me and the "Don't be a dum dum" sign that I told you guys about before. I sat there and stared at that sign and beat the hell out of myself mentally for being a dum dum and not getting my mammogram when I should have six months prior.
When the ultrasound lady called me back I was pretty rattled. You guys know I have 4 beautiful daughters so I am no stranger to ultrasounds. This was the first ultrasound that I felt really, really nervous for. But the gig was pretty much the same, they slap some gel on the roller thing, put it on the area they want to observe and the image pops up on their screen.
Honestly, the image kinda looks the same as pregnancy ultrasounds do in the beginning. But I could see the tumor, it was the big black blotch in the middle of all the white and grey. I'm an analyst by nature and I was studying the hell out of those images, trying to memorize the acronyms she was typing on the images, really thinking I was going to the Google to stalk her notes (so dumb, don't ever do this). She said pretty much the same thing the mammographer did, that she would do the ultrasound, snap some photos, take them to the interpreter, aka the wizard of oz, and that I would have results that day. Well that would just be too easy, wouldn't it? But I'll be damned if I didn't believe her...until she told me that she thought her boss needed to take a look and excused herself from the room. Man I wanted to cry when she walked out, I mean I wanted to sob my face off, get dressed and get the hell out of there. I didn't know what was coming but I knew I didn't want to stick around to find out. She comes back in, and introduces me to her boss, also a very nice and competent woman. Boss Lady lubes up the roller camera thing and puts it right exactly on the tumor, takes a pic, types some acronyms, but then she does something the first tech didn't. She moves the camera over to my armpit and there it was, another black blotch. And this one hurt when she was on it, I had no idea what it was but it made my heart sink to my feet. She measured it and typed more jibberish and then told me they were going to see the wizard and would come back to talk to me. This time I did cry when they walked out, but not a bunch. I pulled myself together and waited for results. But I didn't get them when they came back, what I did get was another change in tone of voice. This time they even looked at me different while telling me to gather my things so they could take me to the consult room to meet the doctor. I knew it then. I knew I had cancer.
The Consult Room
You know, the consult room isn't any different from any other room you go in when seeing the doc. But that didn't make it any less scary. All I wanted to do was run to Alex and bury my face in his chest but instead I was sitting in the consult room alone waiting for The Grim Reaper to come in and tell me I have 2 weeks to live (I'm drama like that). The doc comes in and tells me that there is a good sized tumor in my left breast and a swollen lymph in my armpit. He says that while it may be benign, he couldn't rule out cancer so wanted to me to have a biopsy of both that day. He told me to go have some lunch and come back at 2:00 for the biopsy. He actually said much more than that but that is all I could hold onto. I felt like it wasn't really happening or something, it was surreal, it was almost like Charlie Brown's teacher's voice, with a couple words that would pop out loud and clear. wah wah wah...TUMOR..wah wah wah...CANCER...wah wah wah...LYMPH NODE...wah wah wah...BIOPSY...I couldn't believe he was saying those words talking to ME about ME. I'm never the patient...I'm the caregiver...I couldn't get my head around all of it. And then he says "do you have any questions for me?". Ummm...yea like a fucking million but nothing that I can articulate, all I could do was force my head left and right indicating that I didn't have any. I don't think I muttered one word to him, and then he was gone. I remember telling myself not to freak Alex out, I wanted to pull myself together and act like I wasn't scared and I think I did ok. I didn't have an appetite so I just went home and worked a little before going back for the biopsy.
The Biopsy
IT FUCKING HURT! No really, it FUCKING hurt like a mother! I was put in the same ultrasound room, it was completely sterile, they laid me upside down for it to make it easier for the doc to do his thing. He lathered me up with some soap and then something that smelled super sanitiz-ey, injected some numbing medication in my breast, cut a small incision on the side of my breast, told me I would hear a beep and then he would pull the trigger. It's a literal trigger, the device that cuts a piece of your tissue off looks kind of like a gun and he has to pull the trigger on it to cut the piece off. The first cut wasn't bad, but the following 2 were kind of tough mostly because I felt anxiety each time I heard the beep. Once they took all the samples they needed they put a titanium clamp on the tumor so that if it had to be removed in the future it was tagged and easy for the surgeon to identify. But really, the hardest part about the breast biopsy was the numbing medicine. It burns going in but it's not bad after that. The lymph node though--I'd rather give natural childbirth than go through that shit again. To be fair, they told me it was going to hurt. Apparently the lymph node is made up of nerves and while they can numb the area around it, they can't numb the nerves. So the drill was the same, inject pain meds, beep, pull the trigger. I thought I was going to friggin hit the roof the with the first sample he cut off, and of course I started crying like a little friggin baby. He apologized, did another and then injected blue dye into the lymph node for the same reason they did the titanium clamp on the tumor. He tried to talk to me a bit after but I was too busy crying and feeling sorry for myself to talk back. I think I mumbled a thank you to him but not much else, I can't say I liked the guy even though he did exactly what he was supposed to do. Once the biopsy was complete this really, really nice nurse came to me and cleaned me up and then had to push her body weight down on me to help close the incisions. It wasn't very pleasant and she apologized a lot, and of course I cried LOL. Get it together Leslie, shit! After the 10 minutes of pressure she closed me up with sterry strips, told me I would probably bruise a little, instructed me not to take baths and to be careful getting it wet in the shower. Then she dropped the nuclear bomb on my chest. I had to go have ANOTHER MAMMOGRAM ON MY BIOPSIED BOOB! So I did, it hurt, I survived. After that I was all done and the waiting game began. But really, I already knew. I knew in my heart and had known for hours. I don't really remember leaving the Cancer Center that day, I don't know if I even said anything to Alex at all on the drive home. I was pretty depressed that day, Thursday June 21st.
The Phone Call
Over the weekend I was busy cleaning the house we had moved out of and trying to get settled into the new house as well as moving Alex into his apartment. Yes, for those who didn't know, Alex and I moved into seperate residences recently. While we love each other dearly and loved the 2 years we lived together, we acknowledged that we needed to take a step back. Integrating not just families, but 2 drastically different cultures proved to be more challenging than we had anticipated. I'm not sure where we were headed before all of this new journey started, but I can say that things have been put into persprective for us and we are very strong and united as a couple. So we were very busy with that, and while I did have moments where I felt scared and anxious, for the most part I was busy and doing ok. I knew that I would get results the following Thursday so I was just waiting. Well, Tuesday evening I got the phone call. And wouldn't you know it--I missed it. It was after 6pm when I got the voicemail so I couldn't call back, but it was that original doctor from Scott and White, you know the stranger doctor with the stutter and nervous laugh -- it was her. I wasn't expecting it to be her but it was and she told me she had results and wanted me to come in the next day to go over them together. She was talking to me so gently so I knew it was bad. Alex and I went in first thing the following morning, Wednesday June 27th, both nervous but handling the nerves differently. I shut down completely, Alex is super positive and uses humor to try and cheer me up. We get called back and she tells us that the tumor is malignant. I felt like Emma in Terms of Endearment. She went on to tell us that the lymph node was also cancerous and that she was sending us to meet our Oncology team the next day. She said a lot but I didn't hear anything else. I felt Alex's hand on my back but it was just a blur and foggy. I felt dizzy, outside of my body, scared, mad, overwhelmed, paralyzed. I don't remember leaving that office or that drive home either. While I already knew in my heart that I had cancer, I don't think I had accepted it in my head. I thought maybe they would tell me it was benign but needed to come out. Or that it was pre-cancerous and needed to come out. I do remember her telling me that things were going to move fast and boy, she was right. There were so many procedures after that day, hence the title of this section, Part 1. I wasn't prepared, but are we ever?
Are we ever prepared for life's curve balls? Or fast balls? Or change-ups? I don't know. I knew my Grandpa was dying, I knew it for months, I made trips to go see him and care for him, I took the girls to go see him while I still could. But when he died, it took my breath away, I wasn't prepared. And then with the funeral--I planned those services down to the tiniest detail, but when I walked into the funeral home before the rosary and saw him lifeless in the casket--it stopped me in my tracks, I wasn't prepared. I mean we can plan all we want, plan for pregnancy, plan for a job interview, plan for presentations at work, plan our wedding, our children's graduation party...but are we really ever really prepared? We know it's coming...but I don't know if we are ever prepared. Sometimes we see it coming, close our eyes and swing and it's damn homerun hit! We knock it out of the park! Sometimes though, we swing and miss terribly. Other times we swing and make contact, it may be a single, double, triple even, but sometimes it's a foul and not our best performance. I don't think we ever really know what is going to happen. But I think we give it our best. And that's my plan. I'm going to give this my best. I'm going to fight, I'm going to swing so hard, I'm going to run my ass off, and I am going to make it to that sweet ass home plate. I don't think it'll be a homerun trot, I think it will be a few misses, maybe a few foul balls, hell maybe I'll even have a shitty pitcher and walk my ass to first base. But I'm getting on base, and I'm rounding every damn base til I'm back home. You can bet your bottom dollar on that.
