Anyway, these appointments have become somewhat anxiety-inducing. I found myself on edge for a couple of days ahead of time. The What If monster comes back. I feel fine, but what if they feel something in my lymph nodes? What if they hear something in my lungs? What if I've been feeling great, but it's all a lie and I'm really riddled with cancer like Wade Wilson before he did the whole mutation thing to become Deadpool? (Sorry, I watched the movie again last night.)
The anxious brain is a funny thing. Sometimes it makes me want to cancel the appointment because obviously I'm still fine and don't need to waste my time. Sometimes it makes me want to cancel the appointment because if there is something wrong, I don't want to know about it and want to live in a world of "ignorance is bliss." Sometimes I want to make the appointment even sooner so I can go and make sure I'm fine and move on with another 6 months of my life. See how backwards all of that is? I resign myself to just go to the appointments as scheduled like a big girl because I'm most likely being a dumbass.
So I did. Walking into the Cancer Center brings up a lot of different emotions. First, as I step off of the elevator and walk toward the Breast Center, I flash back to the first time I walked that hall with Chris, and the complete fear that I was feeling. The heaviness, the desire to turn back around and run out of that building, the way I clung to him because he was literally keeping me moving forward. It seems so fresh - like it was only a week ago...
Once I get to the center and check in, that feeling goes away. It's just another appointment - for a little while. When I get to the mammogram waiting room, full of other women, I usually get strange looks because I'm one of the youngest people in there. Then they take me back and I get the history questions, which I sometimes have difficulty remembering. It feels like it was so long ago...
Then I wait. I wait for results. I wait for my follow up appointment with the surgical oncologist's nurse practitioner. I wait with women who are now going through what I did those years ago. I see where I was then and where I am now, and I'm thankful. I calm myself and try to help others by reciting mantras in my head. It helps.
Then I get called back for my appointment, answer the same questions I'm asked every 6 months (an improvement over weekly questioning), and wait again for the NP. A little more anxiety of what she might find, but the first thing she says when she enters is that everything is fine. Relief. A little more anxiety when she feels my lymph nodes. Again, everything is fine. More relief.
It's such a roller coaster. It's been three and a half years since my surgery. A year and a half more before my appointments spread out to only once a year, and I hit that exciting 5 year mark. I've gone through phases of being completely fine and at ease with what happened and feeling victorious, then having to mute the word "cancer" on Twitter because I didn't want to be reminded, and everything in-between over these past years. It will be interesting to see where my brain is when I hit that point.
