Smooosh

One of the things I've noticed about the far-away clinic is they are thorough. Or obsessive. One of their requirements for ladies of a "certain age" is a baseline mammogram.

I've never had one of these before, until yesterday. Now I know what all the jokes in Ladies Home Journal are about.

To begin with, I'm not a well-endowed girl. I'm lucky to fill out a B cup at my largest, right before AF comes. So logistically, I was not sure how this was all going to work. But trust me, they find a way.

For those of you who have not gone through this yet, here is the run-down of the whole process.

First, you arrive, get registered and fill out a form which documents many things, including all the hormones you have been on in your life. Needless to say, I've been on many hormones. So it took a while. Then you go back to a locker room, and you dress in a hospital gown, keeping your bottoms on. You are called back by a female tech, and you are put in a small room with the machine, and a big clear wall thing which the tech stands behind when she takes the film. So you take your arm out of one side of the gown, and the tech puts a small pastie on your nipple. I was amazed by the varied types of pasties they had, some with flowers, some with bright festive colors. Mine was more austere, small and plain green. Then the tech gropes you, moving your boob onto the machine, getting it just so. Then she tells you, "Get ready" as the top of the machine comes whirring down towards your somewhat violated-feeling boob.

Oh my! Just when you think the machine has smooshed your boob as much as possible, the tech hand-tightens it a little more, tells me to hold my breath (as if I could even breathe with my boob in a vice) and runs back behind the screen and takes the picture. Time in the boob vice: 15 seconds max. But it feels like it will never end. And hurts about as much as having your boob in a vice sounds like it would hurt.

My tech took 6 pictures total, 3 on each boob. There was the top view, diagonal view and the side view. Smooshed from all angles. Then I went back to the waiting room while the radiologist reads the film. I had to then go do 2 more films (ugh! but the tech warned me this is common, and it does not mean anything is necessarily wrong) and wait some more. The radiologist then came out to tell me everything was fine, my boobs are dense (Hey! They are very educated boobs!) which is common in younger people. And then you leave. Oh wait, you put your clothes back on (important step!) then leave. Remove the pasties at your own discretion.

All in all it took about 30 minutes. My boobs ached a little afterwards, like when you are on PIO. A day later, they feel about back to normal. I wouldn't plan on high-impact step class for a day, but other than that, no problems.

Compared to all the other medical invasiveness I've endured through all of my IF diagnosis and treatment, I'd say it's on par with a non-painful HSG (mine didn't hurt all that much, but I understand some ladies have it a lot worse). Not fun, but tolerable with no lasting effects.

So that's what I did yesterday, what did you do?