Caring for My Chaos

  For those of you that follow this blog, you know that in January, I had gone in for my yearly mammogram that I get to have at an early age due to my mother having breast cancer. At that appointment, they set me up to have an MRI since I have a high risk of developing breast cancer. Today I had the MRI. It's not as uncomfortable as the mammogram I have to say, but it's still no fun. There is no dignity when it comes to these things. At least I got to keep my socks on. You lie on a table face down with your boobs in holes in the table. The table then slides into a tube that makes horrendous noises. They even gave me earplugs, the noises are so bad. I had to lie still for 20 minutes, but at least there was no squishing or smooshing. They put in an IV so that they can inject contrast at one point during the picture taking, which doesn't hurt at all and I got a good technician who knew what she was doing when she put the IV in. That didn't hurt and no bruising! Bonu...

As many of you know, my mother passed away from breast cancer. Because of this, I have had to have mammograms since I was 30. I did a baseline mammogram at 30, then got to wait until I was 40 to start again. Each year is the same. Change into a robe, wait in a waiting room with other scared women, pose in unnatural positions while a machine smooshes my breasts into even more unnatural positions, wait in a waiting room for them to call you again. Last year and this year, they thought they had found something so I had to have ultrasounds done too. Thankfully, it came back that there wasn't anything. For those who have not had the chance to experience this, I am not going to lie. It hurts. It's uncomfortable. But, they are also necessary. This year I have to go get an MRI done this summer. Given my family history of cancer, (my father passed away from esophageal cancer two years ago) I am considered high risk and the risk is high enough to warrant this test. It gives a clearer p...