From 'Beyond the Sea'

I have a new mantra. Every morning and night after I brush my teeth and apply my anti-wrinkle creams, I repeat to myself in the mirror that I am a brave and strong woman. Not sure if it works though. Today I woke up way before my alarm clock was about to ring. I lay in bed too depressed to even get up and fix me some coffee. I felt lonely and almost forty. I am lonely and almost forty. The truth is, time is unraveling fast and I don’t know how to catch up. Penny says that I look depressed and that it is normal to feel depressed when your husband leaves you for your best friend and your house burns down (she keeps repeating it in details as if making sure I don’t forget!) but I want to shake off this melancholy and reinvent myself. At first I thought it was going to be easy but now I’m having doubts. Also, we have a new person in the office courtesy of new CEO ‘upping’ (his favorite word!) our game with a customer service representative (a dull corporate robot) that he handpicked himself. Her name is Annie Davis. An ugly character with a friendly name. I showed her how to edit a PDF document and later when Brian came round she told him that she ‘figured it out’! When somebody shows you how to do something that’s not called ‘figuring it out’! I was pissed off. I am tired of being nice and have decided to create an alter ego to help me develop some nasty traits that will help me deal with nasty people like Richard, Hope, and Annie Davis. I was thinking what would be an appropriate badass name for my new self when Klaus and Vincent showed up by my desk and asked why I was mad. I explained that I wasn’t mad but deep in thought. Klaus said I was subconsciously mad. Vincent agreed. I felt that I was getting mad but just because they were pissing me off with their insightful questions and opinions. So I told them my name conundrum.

Lily Poppy is such a weak name. What were my parents thinking? How am I supposed to be a strong woman when the slightest wind sends my petals flying? What is a strong name?

‘My dog’s name is Warrior’ said Vincent.

‘What are you saying – that I should look into dog’s names?’

‘No, I’m just saying it’s a strong name.’

‘I need a strong woman’s name.’

‘Ronda Rousey’ said Vincent.

‘Who the hell is Ronda Rousey?’

‘She’s a cage fighter’ said Vincent. Klaus watched our exchange like an exciting tennis match. I had no idea that cage fighting for women existed. Neither did Klaus.

‘Is she fighting men or other women?’ he asked.

‘Other women’ said Vincent.

‘So there are more of them!’ said Klaus impressed.

‘Of course there are more of them – she is not fighting herself’ I said.

‘She could take out a few men, too, I’m sure’ said Vincent, the expert in Ronda Rousey. Richard’s mother’s name is Rhonda. I want to be strong but I’m not that desperate to take the name of my former mother-in-law. I am actually, but there must be another strong name that I could appropriate.

‘Dolly Parton was named after a sheep and yet she is a strong woman’ said Klaus. ‘It’s not the name, it’s you. If you are not happy, change yourself not your name.’

‘She was not named after a sheep’ I said. ‘Dolly Parton came first. Dolly the cloned sheep came after. Who would name a child after a sheep?!’

‘My cousin named his child after a dog’ said Klaus. ‘His wife is Italian and she wanted the name to be Salvatore and now they call him Toto. Like he belongs to Dorothy. But he is cute boy. And you,’ he looked at me, ‘you have the name of a flower, not of a sheep or a dog. Flowers are pretty and you should be happy.’

Klaus is right, but it’s difficult to be happy when your husband runs off with your best friend. It feels like they joined forces and blew all my petals away and I am now in a field full of blossoming wild daisies and poppies, that one balding flower that nobody wants.

Call me maybe...not

Okay, so torn between American and European guidelines about preventative mammography, I finally decided to meet them somewhere – almost – half way, and at 43 have my first screening.

I showed up at the clinic on time – unlike the two previous times in the span of two years, when I deliberately missed the appointments – signed in and followed the nurse down the corridor to preventative medicine. She handed me a white bathrobe explaining the process: disrobe completely from the waist up, put belongings in the tiny locker and wait to be called in the adjacent waiting area.

I did as she said and feeling somewhat violated by the hospital bathrobe proceeded to the waiting room. There were four women inside but no chatter. It was cold, very cold. Actually it was so cold that even my inverted left nipple almost fully popped out. I sat down waiting for my turn and about ten minutes later another nurse showed up and called my name.

We went to the mammography room and she asked me if I had used antiperspirant. I said no because the instructions I received in the mail said not to use deodorant. She asked a few questions about family history – not in general, but related to boobies. She explained what she was about to do and instructed me to put my left boob between two plates of the mammo machine. She then proceeded to wind them up clamping my breast tightly between – and I mean tightly! It was painful, and I could not move an inch. If the building crumbled down at that very moment I would be stuck with (or in) the machine. Sort of like Jeff Daniels in the movie Dumb and Dumber, when he licked the frozen pole gluing his tongue to it in the process. The nurse  took an image, which was fast, and loosened the plates letting my boob free. I massaged it complaining about the treatment: my boobies are not that perky to begin with and they don’t really appreciate being squeezed to oblivion by a machine. In so many words. The right breast then endured the same harassment and that was it.

The nurse said that it takes up to a week to receive the results but on day three which was a Friday afternoon, my phone rang and a different nurse told me that I have dense breasts (which sounded like quite a compliment) and that the right one is okay, but the left one needs more imaging because there is an architectural distortion present. My heart sank a bit – a big bit – while I was trying to assess the seriousness of those two words: architectural distortion. I told her that my left nipple is naturally inverted but she said that this was in a different area, 3cm from the nipple, on the left side – at “nine o’clock” position and about 0.5 mm large. Or something like that. I was trying to remember as much as possible, but somehow her words kept bouncing back without being processed. She scheduled me an appointed for the following week and hung up. I was left with my architectural distortion, deep anguish and, of course, the Internet. I immediately searched for the newly discovered term, hoping that the results will reveal a trivial asymmetry in the boobie mass. Turns out, AD is a disruption of the normal pattern of structures in the breast (a very simplified definition) and although it is most likely nothing to worry about (yeah, right) it is also the third most common sign of breast cancer. So, yes, cold sweat – a whole weekend of cold sweat sprinkled with all kinds of information and personal experiences shared on internet forums. By Sunday afternoon, I was an architectural distortion expert with a panic distorted mind. On Monday, I went back for another photo shoot called tomography, got more pictures taken at different angles – sliced, I think they said – went back to work, got another call from the nurse saying that they would also need to do an ultrasound. Okay. Went back for the ultrasound. I lay down on the bed in the dark room, was propped up on the side, had some ultrasound-friendly gel smeared over my poor, left breast, which I realized I loved so much (who cares about the inverted nipple?!) and watched the nurse freeze images on the screen. And what was on the screen? Some fifty shades of grey that I could not read. Then a blast of orange-red. The blood flow. The nurse just kept clicking and clicking, I guess looking for the “money shot” as I think they call it in fashion. I asked her if she saw anything…you know…at which she replied that it is not her job to discuss that with patients, that she just takes images, and the doctor will soon come in and speak to me. So, that’s it: the doctor will speak to me. I felt a cold shiver run down my back, I skipped a few breaths and like a bad swimmer in a wide, muddy, and powerful river, let myself be carried by the flow. The doctor will soon show up to push my head under water anyway. The nurse finished her patient case number xxxxx which I was, told me that the radiologist will come in in a few minutes to discuss the findings, and left. I got up and quickly put on my clothes. I stood in the room, like on the gallows, looking at the door through which the executioner was about to appear. I was on the verge of a full blown panic attack. I wanted to run away. I had to pee. Why did I even agree to have the stupid mammogram?! Where is the doctor? What is taking so long? It’s been almost three minutes! Or four? Or an eternity?! I had to pee. I stepped out of the room. The restroom was just outside the door…then I heard the “doctor’s door” open. I froze, just like an image on the ultrasound machine. I took a deep breath and with my head (seemingly) high went back to the room to face the verdict. The radiologist was quite young, pretty, with a pleasant smile. Reminded me of Zoe Saldana. I thought of Avatar, the first movie I saw in 3D. I still have the glasses at home. Those weird, uninvited thoughts.

I looked at the doctor, withholding breathing. She was surprised I was already dressed. Said that patients usually dress after the visit is over. “You are fine”, she said. What? I needed to hear it again just to make sure I wasn’t having a psychotic episode in which I was hearing what I wanted to hear. “You are fine”, she confirmed. I almost let my bladder go. She said some other things which I don’t even remember. All that was important was that she took the noose off my neck and let me walk. I wanted to lift her from the ground and twirl her around the room and in my mind I did exactly that. In reality I squeezed her hands and exclaimed a thank you. I left. I went to the restroom and started to cry. Tears of joy take us to a different dimension it seems, because if you think about it, they are not that common. I let them flow, myself sort of floating between two worlds, liberated.

Mammogram false positives and the anxiety they bring are some of the reasons that they are not recommended in Europe under the age of 50. They are said to cause unnecessary stress that in combination with unnecessary extra screening  outweighs the benefits, especially in women with no family history of BC. What they don’t mention is the new appreciation of life one gets after a false positive. It’s like flying on the melody of Luis Armstrong’s “wonderful world”. As I was driving out of the hospital parking lot, even the dust on the sides of my not so clean windshield, looked beautiful to me. So if you ever get a call back, please don’t forget that it might be just that. Like a prank call. And hopefully it is. And nurses, please don’t call us for “more imaging” on a Friday afternoon unless you are scheduling it for Saturday morning, because whatever it is that you have to say, surely can wait until Monday. Let us have a peaceful weekend.