The Invisible Black Woman

So I mentioned a bit ago that I was waiting on some results of the breast variety. Well, that leads us into today’s episode. Today, instead of having my head or heart examined some more, I got a bit of a break. I got to have my breasts put under a microscope. Let me note that I was overdue on this checkup by not weeks, not months, but years. Years. I had all but convinced myself that what I didn’t know couldn’t hurt me, while simultaneously building up this dread about my first mammogram. So why not pick the time when I felt the most unsettled to also get my boobs looked at? Made total sense to me. I did my e-check in beforehand. That way, I didn’t have to worry about having to signing in or registering when I arrived. That was the beauty of MyChart. I did my e-check in the day before. They said we were supposed to get there at 3:05 PM. Of course, we were late. And no, not because it took hubby a while to get ready, but because of the usual reasons. I was running behind schedule. Literally: The. Story. Of. My. Life. Thankfully, checking in ahead of time online has its perks.

So, even though my appointment was at 3:20 PM, and there were several other patients that had clearly been there a while longer than I had, when I arrived, I got to go straight to the back. Hubby couldn’t go back there with me. I have to say I got some pretty wicked side eye as I went on in before several other patients who were already there.

I was escorted into a patient room in the back. There was nothing really special about it. It was a small waiting room that was obviously made for two people. Go figure. There were two chairs there, along with a table filled with magazines. I guess it was only meant for two people if the other person accompanying you was female.

So I sat there and waited. Every so often, one of the nurses or techs (I presume) would pop their head in and say they were having some difficulty pulling my order from the system. I was tempted to tell them that I didn’t have an order. When I filled out my paperwork, it asked me whether or not I had a doctor’s order. Since it was a screening, I wasn’t required to have one. So I wondered if the fact that I didn’t have a doctor’s order for this mammogram screening had anything to do with it. I decided I’d let them figure it out on the off chance they would make it a thing if I said I didn’t have an order. A little while later, I was told they’d found my “order” in the system. I was then escorted to the exam room for the mammogram.

I walked into a room with a machine jutting out from the wall that seemed to almost take up the entire room. Or maybe that’s just how it felt. There were two thick connecting plates, for lack of a better description, where the technician placed my boob, one at a time. The machine would do the work of keeping it in place—mostly—while the technician turned the knob to get an even closer look. In a lot of ways, I felt like she was packing sausage. Here she was, grabbing one of my breasts that was easily no less than 1/4 of her weight with both hands, placing it gingerly on the plate while fighting against gravity to not have it spill out any further than it already was. Then, bless her heart, she would gently grab the “spillage” and roll it back into place as best as she could.

It was not a comfortable experience, I will admit, but I definitely made it bigger in my head than I thought. I expected to be in incredible excruciating pain, based on all the stories I heard and comedians I’d watched tell the tale of their experience. But then I remembered that my sister had given me a tried and true trick that she’d used for herself: Tylenol or Motrin at least an hour before to help with any pain or post-exam soreness. So I figured that must have done the trick.

Speaking of exam prep, I remember weeks before said mammo, I was talking it through with my bestie and telling her all the anxiety I was feeling leading up to it. She recounted something she’d experience when she was much younger related to her—ahem—breasts, and how she made it through relatively unscathed. It was meant to be a pep talk, but I’d be lying if I said that what she shared scared the living hell out of me. I’ve never had the heart to tell her that her pep talk had the absolute opposite effect.

Once I finished my exam, I felt at least like I’d ripped off the band-aid. For better or worse, it was no longer something that would be looming larger than life over my head. I’d gone ahead and done the right, responsible and brave thing and gotten my first damn mammo, none-of-your-damn-business years later than I was supposed to.

Far as I was concerned, the worst was now behind me. And that is absolutely what I thought until the test results came in less than 24 hours later…