(With apologies to Cake for the title)
Dear Reader,
Let me say right up front that I am fine. Fine, I say. And I mean it.
But Word Raccoon has been on a bit of a nail-biting adventure, if you will. (She was concerned, me not so much.)
Two days after Mawgy passed, I had my regularly scheduled mammogram. Two days before her memorial, I was asked via a message on the medical portal to make an appointment to come back in for a rescan.
I wasn’t concerned, not really, because I had been to my GP recently and we had discussed what she was pretty sure was a swollen lymph node under my arm.
This seemed to be the reason for the scheduled rescan and an ultrasound.
I could go on and on about the labyrinthine nature of our insurance network’s preferred provider, and I will: how my doctor’s office had called me directly and how, when I returned the call, the woman who answered wanted to reply to me from my chart (which I already had access to) rather than transfer me to the clinic. When she would not listen, WR disconnected the call with her frustrated little fingers and called back and got someone else who was much more sympathetic.
The sympathetic woman, however, also began trying to read from my chart. WR informed her that we knew all that, but that we were trying to talk with the nurse who had called us from our doctor’s office, and would she please connect us.
She tried and said she wasn’t getting a response. But at least she tried. I told her that I lived close enough that I might just pop over and ask in person. (I didn’t. That just seemed a little too forward, though WR considered it.)
I sent a message to them instead, asking the nurse to try calling again. (I had been right by my phone when she called the first time, but for some reason my phone doesn’t always ring, so I didn’t hear it. Curses.)
I was not about to tell Barry about the ordered rescan until after his mother’s memorial service, so I told my hair stylist instead when I went in for my already scheduled, conveniently timed, appointment, knowing she and I would be on the same page: very likely nothing, just that swollen lymph node, good thing to keep to yourself for now. Testing to follow.
There’s something about saying the thing aloud that bleeds the (faint) worry from it.
I decided to wait for a return call.
It came during visiting hours at the funeral home, when I was talking to Zack and Erica, and I was able to step outside and answer it, get the needed information. I still said nothing to anyone. No need to worry anyone, I figured. There was enough going on.
I did share the news with Barry a couple of days later.
Today I went for the rescan and ultrasound.
As I predicted, all is well, and it was just the swollen lymph node clouding the image.
There has to be a poem in watching a lymph node on a screen during an ultrasound. That’s not what we usually associate with ultrasounds.
I am grateful, I truly am, and though I wasn’t so worried, I did feel relief to know that I will only need a followup in three months to make sure, but that things look fine.
That being said, WR and I are eagerly awaiting the survey we will inevitably receive soon from the hospital, because we have a beef.
The imaging lab is in its own little area, and the mammography equipment is on the left, with a little TV area just outside it. The dressing rooms are across from the TV.
While another woman and I sat there in thin gowns that opened in front (mine was too small, but I managed to hold it closed) and nothing else on top, they brought a male patient through for imaging on the other side of the hall but still very near.
The other woman asked if she could go get dressed.
The man was ushered into a room and the door closed, but still…I weighed my options. I, too, could ask to get dressed. I could ask for a blanket or a bigger or second gown. Alas, I had left my jacket in my vehicle. At the very least I could complain.
I actually got up and went into my dressing room, considering getting dressed without permission (they had told me earlier to hold off until the ultrasound was read), but I decided that surely the guy would be in there for a while and surely they were almost finished with me.
He was and they were.
While there were things I could have done (I always try to find my agency; sometimes helpless is as helpless doesn’t), they should never have put me in that position. WR wanted to make a scene, but I told her again to wait for the customer survey.
All things considered, though, we are relieved and grateful for the results, though we truly believed that would be the outcome.
We are tired and hoping to submit some poetry. We wrote a bit last night.
Reading feels right for this afternoon.
Yes, reading.
Drema