Lumpy

It has been a dramatic couple of days. Yesterday morning I (or rather, The Man) discovered a REALLY BIG lump in my breast. I went straight to my GP, who got me a referral to a breast cancer specialist at a big hospital. That's where I was today.

Or rather, that's where we were today. The Man came too, to hold my hand and to interpret the difficult bits.

I spent the day sitting or lying topless in various examining rooms with strange men poking at my boobs. I learned a lot, and one of the things I learned was about the bit in the web page I read in preparation for the mammogram which said,

Having a mammogram requires that you undress above the waist. A wrap will be provided by the facility for you to wear.

I learned that that was not written for Japan, or at least not for the (very good) hospital I went to. There was no wrap. And while I was barely conscious of it at the time, there is something surreal in the memory of sitting half naked in a chair and having a friendly and entirely professional conversation with a man I had never met before. Well, with three different men, actually, at different times.

I now know that I have not one lump but several. They are cysts, and harmless. Repeat that out loud, friends, and rejoice. Say it after me:

H A R M L E S S

Didn't that sound good?

The specialist told me these cysts are very common, although ones as large as mine are less so (but equally harmless). One is almost 5 centimetres. (We gaijin always have to do things bigger and, er, better.) He said that often they shrink on their own, but sometimes they grow bigger. If they get too big or are in an awkward place they can be uncomfortable.

He offered to aspirate them on the spot (suck out the fluid with a needle and collapse them), and I asked if that would be better for my health. He said it made no difference, but most people don't like them being there.

I thought about needles. I thought about lumpy boobs.

I decided to go with the lumpy boobs. Why spoil good news by passing out? The specialist told me that my GP can do the aspiration if I change my mind later, anyway. It's simple. I can get this done on a casual walk-in visit. You know, walk in, ask him to stick a needle into my ... I don't feel like finishing that sentence.

But anyway, I'm thinking that if I grow these things big enough maybe one day I'll end up with cleavage!

More seriously, this incident provoked a lot of thoughts about mortality, the easy way we take the wondrousness of life for granted, the nature of panic, and a lot of other things. For a woman, finding a lump in a breast is a plunge into nightmare of dire possibilities, even though, as I learned from the ever-reliable Dr Google, chances are pretty good it will be benign. I was lucky. It did turn out well.

But for me the really good news is that I got over the panic BEFORE I knew the results. This was a new and entirely welcome experience. I was pleased with myself, especially since when I had a similar scare a few years ago (in that case an ovarian cyst), I was a mess for a week, waiting for some test results. And that was the week AFTER the doctor told me she was more than 99% sure it was harmless - the tests were just to make everything 100% sure. I lost several kilos waiting for those results, and had trouble sleeping. The difference this time is that yesterday morning I was a panic-stricken acid-stomached mess and really annoyed at myself (starving yourself is not a rational response to a crisis), but by last night (still the same day we discovered the lump, and before knowing anything about this alien thing that had suddenly appeared in my body) I ate a decent dinner and then slept like a baby. Today when we walked into that hospital I was calm. I was ready for anything.

So yes, it was a scary experience, but it turned out to be a good one, too, in more ways than the obvious one. I'm counting it as progress. I do not want to be a coward forever, and that was a step forward.

Getting over the needle phobia is the NEXT step.

(And yes, I know that sounds like a contradiction - that I was 'ready for anything' and then didn't want to have the cysts aspirated because I am scared of needles. But needles as necessity are one thing. Voluntary needles because I 'don't like' some harmless cysts are something else ENTIRELY.)