IT’S NOT A BIG DEAL, IT’S JUST CANCER (Blog #58)

By Janet Pearlman**

In 2017, after following “conventional wisdom” that said one could skip the mammogram every other year, I scheduled my mammogram. That’s just the way I am. If I’m supposed to go every year, I do that. If I’m supposed to get a PAP smear every 5 years, I stay (approximately) on top of it. If conventional wisdom says get a mammogram every other year, I’ll do that.

No biggie.

My In-Laws were in town, staying with my sister-in-law and needed a ride to the airport. Could I help? “Sorry!” was my reply. “That’s when I scheduled my mammogram!” I’m a good soldier! I went to my scheduled appointment, and my mother in-law got a ride from another relative. This was during a time when you needed permission to work from home, so I told my supervisor I had a mammogram and had to work remotely. “Okay!” she said. “That’s important, good luck.”

Again, no biggie.

I had my mammogram on a Tuesday morning and was back in the office on Wednesday, working when the phone rang. “Hello, this is Adventist Radiology. We saw something that is probably nothing, but we need you to come in for another mammogram. We’ve set up an appointment for you tomorrow morning at nine.”

How many times has a doctor’s office ever made YOU a follow-up appointment for the next day? For me, it was approximately zero times. In fact, after all of my other mammograms, I had to call the radiology office because no one ever got back to me to say, “All Clear!”

Clearly, this was not all clear.

For the first time ever, I asked my husband to take off work and to accompany me to the office for a follow-up mammogram. He thought I was overreacting, but said yes. God bless him and his family, in order not to think about anything bad, they always assume things are fine. My mother-in-law also said, “It will be fine.”

On Thursday, my husband and I went to get the follow-up mammogram. After they smooshed my boobs thoroughly, they told us to wait, because the doctor was going to look at it immediately. The doctor’s name was Basin. “Like Basin Street Blues, I thought.” Oh, boy. Basin Street Blues. Great association, Janet. Within 20 minutes, we were invited to come speak with the doctor.  “There appear to be seven spots that are in question, but they may just be calcium deposits.  We suggest that you go have a biopsy to be sure”, he said.  Then, THAT office made me an appointment with ANOTHER office, just next to Shady Grove Hospital. Is the tension building for you? Because between the automatic scheduling and the doctor’s name, I was pretty sure that I was in trouble.

I was in trouble.

What I mean to say is “NO BIG DEAL!!! Here it is, eight years later and I’m fine, fine, fine! Do not have a sense of foreboding dread. That’s not necessary! I’m FINE.”

Now.

Because the journey that is cancer is simply not simple, not by a long shot. Not even when it’s pretty simple. Because on some level, you have this heightened awareness that your own body is trying to kill you. That’s just not okay. It’s frightening.

And once you get your biopsy to really see if there IS cancer in your breast, then it’s more than frightening. And then, WHEN YOU WAIT for a week or two before someone can tell you what stage your cancer is? Then, it’s just bizarre - - because you spend minutes of your day thinking, “Is this 'Kill-me cancer' at Stage Four? Or, is this just 'Get-a-surgery' Stage One cancer." HA! You don’t know! You think, “Do I have to write a will?” and “Am I going to die?”  It is weird that they let you walk out of that office without knowing the answer to those questions. Nah, it’s BAD. It’s really messed up. It’s hard to concentrate.

Right now, we are in October. October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month (and LGBTQ+ History Month, but that’s a different blog). This blog is dedicated to raising awareness about breast cancer and promoting screening and early detection.

Do I wish that back in 2016, I hadn’t attached myself to the “conventional wisdom” notion that one could “skip a year” for a mammogram and that was fine? Yeah. I wish I hadn’t skipped a year.  By the time we found my cancer, it had winded its way through all of the milk ducts in my right breast. Well, it wound its way through enough of my (then) very large breasts that the first three surgeries to try remove the cancer failed. Yep. Three lumpectomies; one lumpectomy in December that didn’t get all of the cancer, one lumpectomy in January (followed by three months of chemotherapy) that didn’t get all of the cancer, and a third lumpectomy in April. That third lumpectomy also did not have “clear margins.” When you have cancer, you really want a lumpectomy where the result is “We got all of the cancer!!!!” You do not want to hear, “We did not have clear margins.”

Note: after you have a third lumpectomy without “clear margins,” you really wonder just how invasive the cancer is - - and how much damn cancer you have in your breast. And for me, I kept thinking, “I gotta get RID of these damn breasts because they’re trying to kill me.”

But I am a scrappy New Yorker. And there was no way in hell that I was going to allow some oversized boobs to take me down. I had children to rear. I had a life to lead. Those things had to GO.

This isn’t a horror story about cancer, though. This is really a love letter to all women. Be in love with your life enough to have a yearly mammogram. You are scrappy, too. You can handle Dr. Basin Street Blues. Go get a mammogram.

** Guest blogger Janet Pearlman is a wife and mother of two sons.  She is a writer and an avid storyteller and humorist!  She has dedicated her career to higher education, ensuring that colleges and universities comply with the Higher Education Act and federal regulatory requirements.  She has been Associate Director of Student Financial Services at Trinity University and Assistant Director of Financial Aid at American University.  Janet received her B.A. from Binghamton University.  The views expressed in this blog are solely those of the author.