The land of the blog posts
The hospital is where all of the sick people are, so unless you want to run the risk of becoming one of them, you do not want to be there. Unfortunately, it’s not always avoidable.
In April I found what I thought was a lump in my breast. I had the normal reaction—panic and tears. I discovered it at night, so I pretended to put it aside for the sake of some sleep. The next day started with a lot of fretting. Was this something I needed to do something about, and what should that something be? I overanalyzed the situation with a friend and decided to do a telemedicine appointment. It was free and the doctor would hopefully be able to tell me if I was overreacting or what I should do next.
My telemedicine appointment was very short. We discussed assorted aspects of the lump: texture, nut most closely approximating its size and shape (almond, for the record). The conversation ended with him advising me to see a doctor in person so they could order imaging. It was an odd mix of comforting and alarming. On the one hand, I felt less ridiculous for being slightly panicked. One the other hand, I was wondering how panicked I should be. I made an appointment that day to go see someone at urgent care. Urgent care, while maybe not as bad as the hospital, was not a place I wanted to go. Because I am selfish and I was scared, I dragged my husband Andrew with me. It’s pretty illogical to potentially expose both of us to any sick people who might be there, but the heart wants what it wants, namely to stare distractedly out the window during the drive and have a hand to hold. He patiently waited in the waiting room while I had my appointment. Another short appointment, with the doctor confirming the presence of the lump and sending me on my way with an order for a mammogram and ultrasound. At this point, I would have preferred being told I was crazy because now I was headed to the place I really did not want to go: the hospital.
My imaging got set up for the 27th. This date was the earliest option available so I took it, but I also had my first customer briefing for work on the 27th. The briefing was in the afternoon so I scheduled my appointment for early in the morning to give me plenty of time to get back. The hospital entrance was guarded by someone taking your temperature and making sure you were wearing a mask properly. Everyone was funneled into one main waiting room where you checked in for your appointment. We all attempted to maximize our distances from each other, and pretend that you couldn’t hear what everyone said when they explained what they were here for. Eventually I got called to my next waiting room where I had to change but could also sit by myself.
I was waiting for a bit when a nurse came and explained to me that there had been serious confusion about the scheduling. The doctor who would review the mammogram and ultrasound typically does not come in before 11. She had no idea how my appointment got scheduled so early. She told me they called the doctor and he would be coming in soon but it was definitely going to be a wait. Given my age, she was not sure which procedure he would want to do first so there wasn’t really a way to proceed until he got there. Ignoring the fact that I was sitting there for a cancer screening, my new stress was now around whether I would make it back in time for my briefing. Classic workaholic culture, to make you more concerned about your job than your health. I was very happy I had my Kindle with me so that at least I could get some reading done and distract myself. The nurse asked me what I was reading and we had a short conversation about the premise of my book (Wild by Cheryl Strayed) what she was currently reading (which I don’t remember). For such a sterile setting and serious atmosphere, it was a really nice, human moment and it probably brought my stress levels down by 10 points.
I read for what felt like a long time before heading off for the mammogram. The same nurse did my mammogram, and she did an excellent job of continuing our book conversation in between awkward sticker placements and poses. If you have not gotten one, mammograms are very weird and awkward and uncomfortable. Praise this nurse though, because what I remember most is how we both wanted to read Where the Crawdads Sing and how we had shared experiences around the difficulty of trying to get popular books from the library. If someone has a good strategy for how to waitlist, I think we would both appreciate it.
After my mammogram I had the ultrasound. The doctor came in to talk to me right away, and explained that everything appeared to look OK. Most likely, the “lump” was just really dense breast tissue. He did explain that the downside of dense breast tissue is that it can be hard to see things well, so continued monitoring was important but otherwise he felt that everything looked good. It was a relief for him to explain the results to me right away. Usually you leave medical exams and tests with the nervous uncertainty associated with waiting for the answers. It was a pleasant change of pace to leave feeling calmer than I arrived, and no longer stressed or panicked about cancer. Free to resume job stress only! (I did make it back for the briefing and I killed it.) As for the nurse, well I hope she knows that Where the Crawdads Sing is currently available from the SLC library.