It's Not Cancer, It's Just Idaho

MAY

If you ask any mom with school-aged kids what her busiest month of the year is, she will undoubtedly answer, May or Mayhem as it is more commonly known in mom circles. During this crazy month, there are teacher gifts to buy, last-minute projects to wrap up, school programs to attend, summer plans to finalize. But most of all, this is the month when moms know we can cherish the last few hours of alone time before we become full-time entertainment specialists to our dear children, who will be with us 24/7 for the next three months. So, even though May is always a blurry whirlwind of activity that is hard to recall, I guess this is truly the best place for me to start.

To say that I don’t like this time of the year wouldn’t really be accurate; I actually love it and look forward to it all year. May always finds us perched on the brink of summer, ready to take a swan dive into cool lake waters, anticipating lazy, sunny days spent sitting on the porch reading books and spending time with dozens of nearby relatives.

It is always an exciting month in our house, though bittersweet. The kids—Amanda (15) and Jack (10)—and I are getting packed and ready to head to our lakeside house and summer heaven in Northern Michigan. Every day on the way to school, we count the last days and hours left until our departure; our excitement level rising as the number of school days dwindles. But we are also sad to think of leaving my husband and the kids’ beloved dad behind. John visits us about three times over the summer, which is not nearly enough, and we miss him dearly, but his demanding job doesn’t allow him to get away like we can. He wants us to head north to our family compound on Lake Michigan, and enjoy the beautiful cottage we bought four years ago that once belonged to my great-grandparents. If you add another great to them, you will learn that my great-great-grandparents helped start a small community of summer cottages on the shores of Lake Michigan in the late 1800s. I grew up going to Harbor Springs, this quaint resort town on Little Traverse Bay, almost every summer of my life, as did my mom, as did her dad. Our cottage there is my favorite place on earth, the place that most stirs my soul—to borrow my sister Lindsay’s words.

So, in preparation for our summer exodus from Colorado, May is also the month I try to fit in all my last-minute doctor appointments, along with everything else I have on my to-do list. Gynecologist, endocrinologist, dermatologist, dentist—it’s exhausting for a couple of weeks, but then the summer is blissfully free of any and all doctors and appointments. That was the plan for this summer anyway when I scheduled my annual mammogram for May 15th. I knew I was pushing this date a little because I am almost always cordially invited back to the doctor for a second mammogram, and I needed to leave time to allow for that before our early June departure. I have dense breasts, so I am told, and it seems like they always see something during the first go-round of images that they want to see again. I’m past the point of freaking out about it because it’s become pretty routine. Well, at least I didn’t freak out about it before May.

May changed a lot of things in my life. I mean, it really kind of changed things forever. Looking back now, I see there were so many signs of what was to come. For one thing, I just could not seem to get a deep breath. This was not necessarily because I was out of breath, but more likely because I just wasn’t taking in any long, deep inhalations—like the ones that are so beneficial and nourishing for body and soul. I attributed it to all the rushing around I was doing, but I remember one day I just sort of stopped in my tracks, sat down and asked myself, Hey, what is UP with you? Why are you feeling all this anxiety that’s keeping you from breathing properly? Chill out, okay? Weird. I felt like I was in a general state of unrest. It was almost as if my body were trying to tell me something—like Buckle up lady! Rough ride ahead! I had no physical ailments at all—except of course for not being able to breathe.

As dreaded and expected, I was invited back a week later for a second magnified mammogram. I pulled into the crowded hospital parking lot that day, and because I couldn’t find a space, I ended up parking next to the Rocky Mountain Cancer Center, which is the building next to the Boulder Community Foothills Hospital. I suppose anyone might park there and feel a bit squeamish about the fact that they were parked at the Cancer Center, and I am certainly no exception. But in addition to my creepy parking location that day, I also remember having a sort of slow motion moment where I watched an older man shuffling into the Cancer Center, his head bent down and looking at the ground. As I drove slowly and humbly by, he turned his head toward me and we made eye contact, and for just a brief second I felt such compassion for him, and felt so sorry that life had brought him to the moment when he had to walk in those doors. It was just a little chill that went down my spine at that moment, but a chill nonetheless.

The mammogram waiting area was packed as usual. It’s amazing that I don’t usually see anyone I know there because there are so many women moving through the system—admitting, waiting to be called, changing clothes, mammograming, waiting again, finally getting the all clear to go home. But on this day, a friend of mine arrived as I was sitting in the waiting room. She’s a friend I’ve known casually for several years and our daughters are in the same class at school, so we chatted and caught up a little. We ended up sitting next to each other again in the second waiting area, where you wait in your hospital gown while they look at the images they’ve just taken to make sure they’re adequate. As we talked, she confided in me that she was really anxious because she’d had a biopsy six months ago (which turned out fine), but this was her first follow-up checkup since then. She referred to that process months ago as …the worst three weeks of my life! and I thought about how nerve-wracking that must have been for her. I probably saw her at school during this time, and had absolutely no idea what she was going through. Most women tend to be brave and silent while going through this torturous waiting. I now know that the waiting is indeed one of the worst parts. Later, I was glad that she’d shared how worried she was because it made me feel a little less crazy for feeling the same anxiety when I had to wait.

Sitting there with her, I wondered (because I often wonder about such things and firmly believe that everything happens for a reason) if I was meant to be there that day to help her with the waiting process. When you are both sitting there, equalized in your vulnerability by your matching hospital gowns and shared experience, it’s easy to talk. After what seemed like quite a while, she got the all clear. Whew! I could see the relief on her face. Then I started thinking. Hmm…she got here after I did, had extra screening because of her earlier biopsy, and is already gone, and I am still sitting here…waiting. This was the first time I heard the distant music of the twilight zone faintly go off in my head. Wait just a minute now…was she here to help ME get through something? Why the heck was this taking so long? Another tiny chill went down my spine, but I tried to brush it off because they always take forever with my images.

I was getting a little irritated about waiting, and feeling anxious about getting to school in time to pick up the kids. Finally, they called me back into the room. A few more images, a little more waiting. There was a little speck of something or other that indicated something; I believe that was the word they used. So they said I could get dressed and then come talk to the doctor for a moment. Okay, but you see, I only have a moment because I’m late to get my kids and I have a busy life, and I’m trying to pack up to leave for the summer and this really doesn’t fit into my day so much. I walked into the X-ray room, coat on and ready to go, for the quick explanation of an indication of whatever, and I saw that the doctor had all my images propped-up and laid out against the lights. Whoa, nothing like a dozen close-up views of your breasts to get your attention and stop you in your tracks.

Walking through the door of his office that day might as well have been the moment I stepped onto the moving conveyor belt that is the path of cancer. I truly felt the world begin to move beneath my feet, just as it does on a moving walkway. You know the ones like they have at the airport, Stand Right, Walk Left where you are slowly but undoubtedly shuttled along in a forward direction, and you really can’t do a whole lot about it except maybe jump over the rails on the side, which is exactly what I began to feel like doing. Just like at the airport, when you first step onto the conveyor belt, it feels a little strange and unbalanced. There are no exits on this moving walkway, only an end that is so far off in the distance that you can’t even begin to see it. No matter how hard or how fast I tried to walk backward now, I could never get back to the place where I started—my life before cancer. Life had plunked me onto this conveyor belt, and I was stuck on the trip. Buckle up lady, the ride has begun.

The doctor began to explain that many women have micro-calcifications in their breasts, which are quite common and usually nothing to worry about. The hospital just switched to the new digital mammography technology a few months ago, so this was my first ever—whoowee! —digital mammogram. At this point, a long spray of words came out of his mouth. In fact, there were so many consecutive words I didn’t understand that it actually made me laugh. Run that one by again, doctor? It would be weeks before anyone said the word cancer to me—I still think that is odd—but I now know that ductal carcinoma in situ and lobular carcinoma in situ are words you do not want to hear your doctor sprout out of his mouth.

The problem with my micro-calcifications was that these tiny specks I could barely see on the blown-up image were situated in some sort of a circle pattern—like a few of them had gotten together and collectively organized a little party of naughtiness, which is exactly what they did. Jerks. Well, now I’m going to have to call the school and tell them I’m running late because this delay in my day is only temporary, of course, nevertheless, I am now late because of it. I am already feeling a bit dazed and confused—and possibly in need of a barf bag—and then it turns out that they would like to do a stereotactic biopsy (those words make me shudder head to toe now, but of course didn’t then) because although these specks turn out to be absolutely nothing like 92 percent of the time, they just have to be sure. Digital mammograms have resulted in many more biopsies being performed because they show so much more than previous mammograms did, especially on dense breasts. If I had a nickel for every time during this process that I turned up on the wrong side of the percentages…well, I would at least have enough money to buy you a cup of coffee.

The next stop on the moving walkway I was now riding (let’s just call it the Cancer Moving Walkway, or CMW, because I am going to be riding this sucker a lot for the next few months) was in the office of this sweet, little, older lady, who was now looking at me with true compassion, which made me really start to worry. Apparently, I needed to schedule this procedure soon—How about in two weeks? Whoa! My breasts and I will be sitting on the beach in two weeks! No can do!

Well then, how about Thursday? As in two days from now.

Okay, fine, if you really think it’s necessary, but I know it will turn out to be nothing. You see, I just have dense breasts. She gets all sorts of insurance information, and then we go into another operating sort of room filled with lots of weird and unfriendly looking equipment, and she shows me the machine where I will be doing this procedure.

It’s fairly non-invasive, she tries to reassure me as she watches my eyes grow wide.

Compared to WHAT? How is lying on your stomach with your breast sticking through a hole, arms balanced over your head every which way, so that some sort of fat needle thing can dig in and take a core sample of your breast NOT invasive?

Later, I came to learn that it actually is non-invasive compared to a surgical biopsy where they have to knock you out cold so they can really get a good scoop out of you. Yeah, that is invasive.

WELCOME TO YOUR FIRST BIOPSY

They have really hustled to get me in to do the procedure in two days, rather than the normal two weeks. Well hey, I have places to go, things to do! This is sort of a time sucker! While I’m not happy about this new distraction, I am anxious to get the procedure over with and move on with my blissful summer. So, two days later I arrive at the hospital in the wee hours of the morning to check in. I’m told that the whole process will take three hours, so John will drop me off, head to work in downtown Boulder, and then come back and pick me up and take me home afterward. I am ushered back to the room with the inhospitable sharp things, and begin to get the low-down on the procedure from the very friendly staff.

I am feeling calm; so calm, apparently, that the nurse says, You don’t seem like the kind of person who would need to take Valium to get through this procedure.

So, I bravely opt out of taking the Valium they offer (huge mistake!) and things start moving along. It’s all fairly upbeat. I’m in the room with a doctor and two nurses, and we’re all sort of joking around. Honestly, it feels like just some silly procedure we have to get through, and then they can go to lunch and I can go home and finish packing. Cancer is the farthest thing from any of our minds, at least from mine.

There are two areas they want to investigate (i.e. biopsy) so I have to go through the whole procedure twice. This involves lying face down, breast through a hole and in a mammogram-like vise while they take many images to see if they have found the spot in question. This means lots of prodding and poking on their part, as well as lots of running, because they are back and forth, all of them squeezing behind the small protective curtain, for what seems like a hundred trips while they take the images. Once they finally find the area, the needle goes to work.

The first go-round goes okay, although ouch! They had warned me that I would feel some pressure and I guess my question for them is, If that is pressure then how on earth do you describe PAIN? I would best describe the experience as similar to what it would be like (I can only imagine) if you were to put your breast in a sewing machine. They go up and down with the needle about thirty times! What are you guys doing, sewing a quilt out of me? Whew.

I recognize one of the young nurses, Caroline, because she used to work at the health club where I belonged. She is a pretty, tall, blonde who has the outdoorsy good looks of a Colorado native. Once again I wonder, Is this yet another familiar face that has been placed in my path to help me through this process? We are catching up on news about friends we both know. It is a helpful distraction to talk, and I remember, right as the needle is going in, we are talking about a dear, mutual friend. (There are certainly moments in life when we all feel like our ears are burning, but I just wonder what our friend would have thought if he knew we were talking about him at that particular painful and rather surreal moment.) Caroline’s job is to help me finally flip over, all the while applying pressure to the area they’ve just biopsied. Then I get to lie there and relax while she continues to apply pressure for about ten minutes. (Note—you better like the person who is helping you with this process, because you really get to know each other in those ten minutes while you are gushing blood and she is trying to stop it. I did like her and she did a very good job of keeping me from bleeding to death.)

During this waiting time, the other nurse is asking Caroline (who is doing a great job of just mashing down right on my heart, as she is supposed to) questions about how she’s doing, how is her rock climbing hobby, how is her life going after the accident, etc. What starts out as small talk quickly turns into a heavy and emotional conversation, as my pressure-applying nurse starts to painfully tell us the tragic tale of how she watched her boyfriend fall to his death while they were rock climbing, almost exactly one year ago today. As she slowly begins to tell this terrible story and we listen, she starts