So they rushed me through an appointment to the local Hospital for a Colposcopy yesterday.
Luckily I had a session with my therapist earlier in the morning. We discussed how I've always gone in to hospital and done stuff like this alone and how I feel a bit resentful than no one is ever arsed enough to come with me...then I realised I never ask because I hate to seem needy...but end up being more needy when it all gets too big and scary and the martyr mode kicks in !
She told me to not be afraid to ask for support, not be too hurt if I didn't get it and to ring her later if necessary... I also thought of the kind support I'd had on this blog...
I then rang my Mother and told her that I was going into the hospital, as expected she was obviously not listening as the telly was on in the background, I suppose I got a bit upset and finally spoke to my Dad ..who couldn't come with me as he had a bowls match (!) but volunteered my mother..
Then I thought about what it would be like to actually have my mother there :- anxious and tetchy and making her self the martyr...and thought ...hhmm actually I don't want her there.......
Anyhow with weird synchronicity - I rang my friend, whose Dad is dying, just to see how she was and turns out her Mum had an appointment at the same place and time ! -( All the appointments are for three o' clock and you all just sit and wait for your slot....)
So I drove us both down to the Hospital, and actually it was good to talk to her, I feel for her so much, and hadn't had the chance to tell her how sorry I was.. She has been with her husband almost fifty years. he built or fixed everything, his presence is everywhere in that huge house...and yet not, as he now lies dying in the hospice. It was good that she could talk to me. She is facing the future alone in her sixties and it terrifies her. Her honesty was humbling.
I got to go in really quickly and the nurses were lovely...as it is a tad disquieting stripping off, climbing onto the hi- tech straddle chair, then seeing the badger appear on a sony monitor...in glorious technicolour live and direct and then wahay up the pink tube to see your cervix winking at you...
At this point I probably should have looked away...the nurse showed me the almost (to me) indiscernible darker pink area and told me it would mean I'd have to have a biopsy as it looked like CIN evidence..although until testing she couldn't be sure...
Just as when a few weeks ago I almost got a coil fitted, the nurse said I might feel "a little sting".
Oh yeah ?
Now I wouldn't say I have a particularly low pain threshold ...I have had broken bones, beatings, tattoos..but I must have a very sensitive cervix ..and as I saw the little metal jaw attachment about to chomp a bit of me, I bloody jumped. ..Christ on a bike it hurt !... Then they dab it with silver nitrate to stop it bleeding..I shouldn't have looked but it was interesting...It's only a tiny spot but it's magnified hugely on the screen.....made me feel queasy though...
I don't think they get many requests for a photographic still...she did look at me a bit oddly...and no it will not appear on this blog..I have few boundaries ...but one has to draw the line somewhere.....
A cup of tea and two painkillers later I am being given leaflets whilst trying to pull my knickers up , and the nurse is talking me through the next stage - which should take place in three weeks if the cells are pre-cancerous... , which will mean more slicing bits off , but thankfully this time with local anaesthetic
(and a good bloody strong sedative I hope !!!)
Everything was cool until the nurse said the fateful words and she must have seen the horror on my face , as she laughed out loud.....If the next stage is necessary...NO SEX OR RUNNING FOR SIX WEEKS... OH... MY .....GOD !!!!!!
Life will have no meaning!
Well it will be a test of the poacher's commitment I suppose....and of my sanity.....
So I go back to the waiting room and my companion has also gone in. She comes out shortly, but has been told to wait to see the Consultant...so we sit ..and we sit into that stage of sitting where everyone else has disappeared and you start to believe they've forgotten about you......eventually she goes back in and half an hour later emerges ...and I can tell she's been crying.......
I take her home, and discreetly ring her daughter.....she has a problem ...not major, but enough to be a final straw for her at the moment. It puts all my self pity and anguish into perspective. I wait until her daughter, my friend, comes back and I brew tea.
I go and see my Mother and she in her emotionally stunted way manages somehow to articulate her concern.
I am late picking up the poacher and the poor lad is soaked to the skin....
I rush him home, run a bath and make soup.....