It’s strange really, when you realize when your two worlds have collided with a deafening crash. The sound echoes and resounded in only my head, spooking me for a minute, wondering if anyone else heard it. But no, it’s all here in my head.
Laying on the table waiting for not one but THREE BIOPSIES of my breasts, I note with amusement the ceiling above me. In this room, it looks like old-fashioned white ceiling of med school dorms, where after being awake for 36 hours you find yourself dumbly throwing sharpened pencils into the air, hoping one or two will stick erectly in the ceiling. Ahh yes…. Good times people, good times.
Laying there, I looked at the ceiling and then at the tech taking the sonograms of my breasts. Quiet and serious, she stared intently at the screen. I glanced at the screen. It was a maze of grey and black streaks. There was nothing at all as she ran the scanner over my breasts. Just when I was about to chalk it up to my hyperactive and paranoid mind the black mass appeared in it’s grotesque form, awakening in my head dormant worries and anxiety.
“Gotcha, ya lil’ bastard” said the tech.
I like her style.
She found the other two lumps in my left breast faster. I hadn’t even known they were there but that is what a mammogram does: picks out things you may ignore.
The doctor came into the exam room next. She went over the lumps, mumbling to herself, barking at the tech and generally ignoring me. I don’t know her and I am not sure if our paths have ever crossed at any trainings or conferences. Interesting to note, as my world in the medical field overlaps with many.
Eventually, the doctor looks at me and starts talking:
“Well, Alainn, we are going to perform a biopsy. Do you know what that is?”
“Yes”
She continues on as though she has not heard me and now she is talking to me like I am a child. “First I am going to put some soap on your breasts. It’s going to feel cold. Then I am going to give you lidocaine. It’s to numb the area. You may feel a prick and a burning sensation…”
At this point, my eyebrows are raised and I have a bemused look on my face. What I am thinking as she drones on is “are you kidding me? I know all this. Why are you talking to me like I am a ten year old?”
“… And finally there will be some loud noises. That’s me taking samples. Understand?”
I smile at her and look like I am concentrating as I reply, “So what I hear is that you will be performing a CNB and that the procedure will be using a needle that has a wider diameter and is equipped with a cutter that removes cores of tissue up to a half-inch long. Yep, I think I got it.”
Needless to say, the doctor just stared at me for a few seconds.
Falling Slowly 
I know it’s irritating, you just have to know that they mostly deal with people who are scared and don’t know the procedure.
you, clearly kick ass.
By: flutter on August 16, 2009
at 10:00 pm
It seems somehow wrong that a person performing such a important procedure would not know a single thing about you beyond your name. That’s sad. When you beat this shit, you’ll have learned a lot from this woman, won’t you?
By: Mrs4444 on August 20, 2009
at 5:46 pm