The ceiling was covered with hundreds of shining little lights. The ceiling was black and the little shining lights looked like hundreds of stars blinking in the distance. I was lying down there on that little bed and I found myself thinking.....if I concentrate enough I can easily image to be lying on top of the deck of a sailing boat, in the middle of the ocean.
It wasn’t surely that.
I wasn’t surely floating in the beauty of a summer night’s sea.
I was laying on a X-ray room bed....covered only with a long hospital gown and the little lights on top of me were only part of the soothing, comforting decoration of this cancer center room were I was waiting for the doctor to enter and tell me how the rest of my life would have been after
This happened yesterday.
I have been waiting for 2 weeks for this starry ceiling.
The mammogram I did last month turned out to be not that good. The doctor spotted an abnormal suspected area in my right breast.
They asked me the permission to have my previous mammograms sent to them to compare them with my new one. When they checked them it was clear that the area was where it was not before.
They couldn’t tell what it was and so they booked me for an ulterior mammogram and also a sonogram.
I have been waiting for this new test for 2 week and how sadly ironic that I went to have these tests done yesterday, the same day of the first anniversary of my sister’s death?
Life has her funny way to trick you and messed up with your emotions.
I have not been talking much about this...
Only my closest friends in RL knew about it.
I decided to simply block my mind. I refused to worry.
Believe me, this I not exactly me....in previous moments I have been scratching walls in the waiting for other health scares...
Strangely, this time this big scare was somehow more manageable....
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Ed, this is what I was referring in your post about hell. .you asked where hell was for us right now...I answered. “Here, waiting”. Waiting for the test to be done.
Surely having witnessed first hand since last April the battle of my friend Maria against breast cancer had given me a better understanding of how handling this waiting. And most of all....I was alone.....I couldn’t have the luxury to break down before time. Who would have taken care of my daughter?
So I held up my breath for her.
I put her in bed each night and hugged her tight and told her “See you tomorrow. I will be here forever, sweet child of mine”
......
And so yesterday the waiting was over.
The bright soothing lights above my head were shining .......even after the results of the sonogram.
They didn’t explode in my head. They remained nice and bright.
Because the results have been negative.
The suspected area is only a cyst. Nothing to worry about. My doctor told me “See you next year. You are perfectly fine”.
While waiting to enter in the starry room I felt the panic got hold of me for the real first time.
During those long minutes my thoughts started to run wild .....i thought about all the people I know that have been scarred by cancer ......my sister, Maria, Secret, Mamie, Jenna...all the people I know who have a dear one fighting with cancer...
I thought about my Italian friend Niki who, exactly like me, yesterday, has been waiting in another doctor’ room. Thousand miles away from me....
She has been less lucky than me...nothing is sure for her but she has been told she will have to undergo surgery to remove a suspect mass found in the back of her uterus. I called her yesterday, after calling my mom.
She was worried but happy for me. I was happy but so worried for her.
She is my rock, she has been my second mom for years, she is my best girlfriend...
She will know something for sure only next week...
She is deep believer....she believes in the power of prayers and she will feel them.
Please.....pray for her, if you can....
I decided i couldn't fall apart just then......i have been so good up to that moment.....i told to myself........you have only few minutes...hold on..dont cry...no tears yet....
So i grabbed the first magazine on the table....i opened it randomly..
It was a picture of Saint Mother Theresa of Calcutta looking at me.........i was reading the famous letters they recently found in which she confessed of having lived for 50 long, painful years withou feeling the presence of God in herself......i was strucked somehow....
I know what my friend Niki would say if i tell her....
But then, finally, they called me and i got in.
When i finally got out of the dark, starry room my friend Maria was there to wait for me.
We hugged in the middle of the waiting room. She will have to go back there next month for her routine check. She has been declared cancer free now but for the next 5 years that office will be very familiar to her...
We went to lunch to celebrate.
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Please, if you are postponing a mammogram...don’t wait...do it. Prevention is the best weapon. Manually checking our breast is also a simple thing to do and let us find something even before any symptom subsides. Plus, October is the official month for Brest Cancer awareness.....
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And now I really need to have strong drink .....after all these emotional up and downs I need to finally relax a little bit...
Its Friday night.......who wants come to pick me up for going downtown and have a nice drink together? I am so in the mood for dancing......:- D
