Hi fools!

How is everyone? Feeling good? Feeling bad? Feeling, I don’t know… perplexed? Tell me. I wanna know what’s on your mind. There are some things y0u can’t hide. I want to know what you’re feeling. Tell me what’s on your mind.

While you gather your thoughts and feelings, I’ll start. Bear with me because I have tried so many times to organize these thoughts, and I just can’t do it. So, I may be a little extra rambly but I do know for sure I am going to be extra vulnerable in this one.

Right now

I’m scared. Several weeks ago, I felt a lump. That was scary. But I wasn’t going to spiral. I had already had an appointment set a few days later for a follow up on my sprained ankle, so I was set. Booby rocks are not a big deal. Big pain (not literally), but not a big deal. I guess the proper term is “fibroids“. Whatever… we’re going with “booby rocks”. I’ve never experienced one, before but there’s always a first time.

First

So, at my appointment, I let my doctor know what I had felt. Before she writes her referrals for me, but cops a feel too. Oops, sorry. Gives me an exam. And then she tells me that she did feel what I felt, but also detected another lump. Okay. Scared. However, she says this is actually a good sign because booby rocks tend to come in pairs. Like socks. Or scorpions. She then referred me for an ultrasound.

As soon as I got home, I called to make my appointment. The radiology place was able to fit me in the same day. Cool. I can get answers one way or another ASAP.

Then

The last ultrasound I had was when I was pregnant. I gotta say, that experience was just so much more delightful and all around funner. But I definitely would have flipped the frick out if I saw something kicking in my boob on this latest ultrasound adventure. (Spoiler: Nothing was moving or kicking in my boob.) Everyone there was extremely kind and tolerated my awkward rambling and dark humor. When I’m scared, I go dark. Like many layers of dark. An onion of darkness, if you will. If you’ve read my previous blogs, seen my Instagram stories, or you know… just know me in real life – just know. It was worse. Be glad you weren’t there.

Since exactly 12 hours after that ultrasound appointment, I was obsessively checking my newly created portal. Yes, they told me it would take about a week. Didn’t matter. I was on that site like it was Amazon Prime and I had just ordered Cheetos Flaming Hot Dill Pickle Cheetos for overnight delivery. Have you seen those?! I. Am. INTRIGUED. In other words: obsessively. But not in, you know.. a scared way. Just an… anxious way.

Then

I called to make my primary care appointment as soon as I had a new notation in that dang portal. All that patient impatiently waiting for the report to say not only did they not find anything conclusive, but they found an additional lump. In case you’re not keeping track, that’s three. This one was marked as abnormal and concerning due to its depth, size and unusual shape. Welllllll that’s not good. Aaaaand now I’m back from anxious to scared. Again. My doctor wrote up the referral for a diagnostic mammogram, from what my limited Googling told me, is more detailed than your regular, annual mammogram. Hence the word “diagnostic“. Oh yea, during this whole process, my Googling that is related to lumps, bumps, and any kind of booby rocks has been severely restricted to like NONE.

That is just a spiral I’m not prepared for. I mean, I have my limits. As it is, during this visit, my Apple Watch alerted me that my resting heart rate was high for no reason.

                                               WELL DUH

Shamefully, I’ve never had a mammogram before. I know. I know… there should be like 5 mammograms in the rearview by now. But I just haven’t. So, this would be my first mammo experience.

Then 

Have any of y’all ever had a mammogram? They are deeply unpleasant. I understand the techs do the best they can. Once again, she was absolutely lovely and as kind as could be, given the super uncomfortable situation.

So anyway, y0u trade your shirt and bra for one of those paper vests and then they take you into a little room with what looks like a giant panini maker and a computer. Then you pop one boob out and put it on the panini maker, strike the most uncomfortable pose ever and hold your breath while the technician turns your mammy into a sammy. A Mammy Sammy. After several awkward poses while they take computer shots of your panini boob, you take out the other one and do it all again. Not that it needs to be said, but there is no fun to be had at that appointment. You don’t even get a lollipop afterward.

The good news about this appointment is that the turnaround is only 48 hours. So only two days to obsess over what’s going on inside me. I can handle it. Not scared. Just anxious.

…And Then

So exactly two days later, my results and report were ready and the doctor set up our virtual appointment right away. Hooray for answers! Well no, not exactly. Once again, tests were inclusive, but once again, they found something else. Aside from the abnormal masses, my lymph nodes are also reactive. That means that there’s something in my body that should not be there and the lymph nodes are trying to fight it off. But yea, still inconclusive. Happy Easter weekend to me!

Scared again.

So now my doctor has written up referrals for a biopsy and MRI.

Still scary, but hopefully the final step to some kind of answer, be it good or bad.

I am so sick of inconclusive.

The Next And Then Is Paused

I keep saying how wonderful all the doctors and staff have been so far. Until it isn’t true anymore, I’ll keep saying it. But insurance? Ehhhh… not so much.

Once again, I called to set my appointments and both places were able to fit me in within the next couple of weeks. Finally I’m getting somewhere – good or bad – at least I’ll be getting somewhere with these lumps and bumps and what have you.

But then I get a call from one place. They actually don’t accept the tier of insurance I have. Welp. Okay then.

Then I get a call from the other place. Even though they were referred for my MRI specifically and I had my previous procedures done there, for some inexplicable reason, my insurance company redirected the paperwork to someplace else. Without telling my primary care provider, much less me.

But wait, there’s more…sort of

Because there always has to be more. In the past few weeks, the insurance company has fumbled referral codes, mixed up hospitals and facilities, phone numbers. They’ve done everything but flat out deny the referrals. It’s going on almost two months of still wondering what is haunting my chest.

My insurance rant has been steady and loud. But that’s a whole other ramble.

 

For now, I’ll stay distracted and keep praying. And do my best to not be so scared.