Just another mammogram kind of day!

Sent into a rather largish room, standing alone, topless and it's a wee tad chilly.   I don't even have to look down to see that evidence via the layer covering my breasts, because there isn't one.   Yep, we're cold.    I don't know how to stand, where to put my hands or how to position my arms, of course feeling like I should stand with arms folded to embrace my bared breasts.   It feels so awkward here, just waiting, and fidgeting.  I'm just not used to starting conversations with people as they enter a room and I am feeling rather exposed.

That was then, early on in this game of Breast Screening...Mammography.

Fast forward to just yesterday, my second official mammogram since "coming of age".   You've got it, I have passed that magic number of years...50 and have been granted the thrill of receiving a yearly letter inviting me for my annual screening.   How lovely!   Really, it is as now I needn't worry about any lack of memory in relation to this very important task.

Last year I actually had a scare when I had found a lump while standing in front of a mirror after a shower.   Thankfully it turned out to be nothing more than a benign mass .   It was mentioned while not ALWAYS the rule, because it was a mobile lump, that was a good sign.   In light of having dealt with melanoma, surgery and treatments it seems natural to me that whenever there is something I feel alerted to it's because I know melanoma has a pretty good likelihood to recur.   That's unfortunately where my (paranoid) thoughts turn to each time I THINK I feel/sense something unknown.

I've come a long way from standing in the room awkwardly waiting and fidgeting and wondering how to address the technician as she arrives to get things started.  .
I no longer worry because first, it is no longer the large cavernous room you are escorted to for a mammogram and also you walk into  the room with the technician.   I'm now at a point; as I found myself to be yesterday, where I am very relaxed about it all and so much so that yesterday we had barely been moments into the room when I began to remove my upper garments.   It dawned on me perhaps I was jumping ahead and said, "Oh, should I be undressing?  I don't want to embarrass either of us!"!    She laughed, " Yes, that's right go ahead!", and she commented that you always know the ones who have been regularly because the door hardly closes and they begin to eliminate layers!  LOL!   That's me!   With the scare last year and all of the medical tests following the cancer diagnosis in 2012, anything goes; nothing is a BIG DEAL!

Even without all of the medical goings on in the last two years you must believe me when I say there really is NOTHING to having a mammogram!   At worst there is a bit of pressure in the proceeding of the mammogram equipment, but minimal indeed! The tech's are wonderful, gentle and very caring and keeping your dignity intact they'll even remind you to remove the little sticky metal dots.   It has all come a long way baby!

If you are due for a mammogram but are hesitant and perhaps fearful, just do it....it's so simple!
Don't be a boob, get your boobs checked!