Emotions, Feelings, Expressions

Before I start this post let me let you all know what has happened. I went to the doctor yesterday and finally got my results. I showed up an hour and a half early to the appointment because I thought they said 1300 when I made the appointment and apparently it was at 1400. Military time, it gets me every time!

I wait for an hour or so in the waiting room. I get called back by the nurse only to do my vitals. You know the vitals where they do the dreaded weight and temp and blood pressure. I laugh thinking about it because when the nurse asks me to get on the scale she goes and sits down at her little desk and tells me to tell her the weight when it comes out. I thought AHA I can tell her it said 110 lbs and all but then I knew she would look at me and my fluffies and know I was a BIG FAT LIAR! So I tell her the weight and no way in blue blazes am I about to post that on here! LOL and takes my blood pressure and sends me back to the waiting room. Why do they do that?!?! You are in this waiting room and if you are anything like me you eyeball all the other people in the waiting room like you are competing for the covetous prize of this bubbly little nurse to call your name. Then when you get the "prize" of being called, it sorta feels like being in the audience of the game show: The Price is Right and they say come on down your the next contestant, I look at all these poor wretched souls waiting in the waiting room and fight strongly the urge to run down the hall after the nurse like someone who just had their names called for the Price is Right. You know what I mean. Arms raised up high, yelling and screaming "THEY CHOOSE ME!" and high fiving the other patients. No? You don't get that feeling after sitting in a waiting room full of patients for over an hour? Its just me? Don't judge me!!

Anywho! So this tiny little blonde calls me back and takes me to the room that is my new waiting room. You know what I mean. They move you from the room where you were surrounded by others to now put you in a tiny match box of a room where you are now waiting all alone. I hate that because they have all these poster looking things on the walls and you begin reading them as you wait then in the silence of that little room you imagine all those symptoms to all those things that the posters have. This time I was in a room in a GYN office and even though I know without a shadow of a doubt I am not pregnant because I had my tubes tied I start reading all these pregnancy symptoms and what you should consult with your doctor and there I was with a phantom pregnancy! No joke people I was rubbing on my fluffies telling it how much I would love it and care for it. OK maybe not really but you begin feeling like that. The nurse had told me that she was not sure if the doctor needed to check me so to just sit in the chair instead of the scary table/bed with the ALL time scary stirrups. People I do not even ride horses so stirrups are scary to me!!

My doctor comes in after 50 hours of me waiting there. NO?! Ok more like 10 minutes but that is what it felt like. She sits down in that little stool they use with the wheels and she has my records in her hand. She then asks me to tell her my symptoms. I had to pause there a minute because I was surrounded by pregnancy symptoms all over the walls that just 5 minutes ago I could have sworn I was feeling so I took a deep breath and explained. I told her about the heavy, abnormal bleeding every other week. I told her about the intense cramps associated with them that sometimes even mimicked being in labor. I told her about the back pain and extreme pressure I would constantly feel and she said "OK Mrs. Perez let's talk".  No longer did the sweet looking, pretty young doctor seem so young anymore but I have to give her credit her sweetness and her beauty stayed. She told me that my cervix was clean and clear of any cancer. That is what I thought I had because I had been diagnosed in 2008 with pre-cancerous cells. I took a long sigh of relief but "the talk" with the doctor was not over. She told me when they did the ultrasound and the scope to go into my uterus they found a baseball size tumor which did come back as cancerous. I did not even know that they tested anything in my uterus for cancer. She does however believe that they found it in its early stages and that all I would need is a hysterectomy and not need Radiation or Chemo. She offered the alternative of killing the tumor with Chemo and Radiation and I keep my cervix and uterus but as I told her. I had my tubes tied 9 years ago because we decided that three children were more than enough for us and I had had such terrible pregnancies so there was no point in doing something like Chemo in order to "save" my ability to have children in the future when I know good and well I am not wanting to be a mother again. Please do not take this the wrong way readers because I love my children more then life itself but I am done having babies and I want to enjoy the three beautiful blessings I have to the fullest and how can I if I am so weak with Chemo? I also told her I was more than willing, more than prepared to have a hysterectomy to end these symptoms so I have made my peace with it all.

She then tells me that I will need to get an ablasion done. Never have I even heard of this. She goes to explain it to me and I appreciate that she understands that I am a visual person so she shows me the main instrument needed for this procedure. It is a 50 foot straw looking thing... OK more like a two foot long straw looking thing that they go in like a pap and go into your uterus and scrape off the tissues they can to send to pathology. Apparently with this she can stage my cancer. She offers to have me come back at a later date to do this or to do it right then and there. I tell her well I'm already here so lets have at it. She begins to tell me to undress and that is when my panic hits. Lately my panic hits me in the form of having to go to the restroom and I tell her that she needs to wait because I have to go to the bathroom. What was I thinking?!?!?! I tell the doctor she needs to wait??!?! Who the heck am I some kind of celebrity or something!!!

OK so I am back in the room and I am patiently waiting again for the doctor to come in. Now I must be hallucinating or something because I kept hearing someone knock on my door and I kept saying come in when no one comes in at all. Boy is my mind going like crazy. Finally the nurse comes in with ALL the instruments needed to do this ablasion. OMG!!! is all I could think because one of them no joke looked like a GIANT pair of scissors. No kidding. I was like are you taking my uterus out now?!?!?! Seriously what is with the giant looking scissors. Then the doctor comes in and attempts to place me in the stirrups. I am 5'0 and she puts those stirrups so far apart my poor feet do not reach and I am practically falling off this table!! To this she apologizes and adjusts them. UH YEA I may be a big girl in regards to my fluffies but I am tiny girl in regards to my height. She first checks to see the placement of my uterus because she was hoping to do a vaginal hysterectomy. But here is where the "good news" continues (please note I am being sarcastic here) she tells me there is no way to do a vaginal hysterectomy because my uterus is way too high up. Also it is way too enlarged so I will need to get gutted like a fish instead of doing the laproscopic surgery. YAY ME!!

The ablasion is not easy. She tells me to take a deep cough so that she can use the cough to insert the giant straw looking thing. I can't though. I tried and all I was able to get was a small baby like cough and that thin straw hurt like crazy going in. While she is scraping away she tells me to take some deep breaths because my anxiety now is not allowing her to be able to continue. I felt horrible. This was one of the most painful things ever to feel aside from childbirth and I thought the biopsy was bad.

I get this news about having cancer and can you believe that I did not cry? I can not believe it! Seriously!! I thought I have prepared myself to hear it but I also thought how much can you really prepare to hear that word? The entire time I stayed with a smile on my face. I talked with my friend Darci who went with me and stayed with a smile on my face. I went to eat with her and stayed with a smile on my face. I came home and told Sammy and the kids and stayed with a smile on my face. I video chatted with my mom and sister and told them the news and guess what? I stayed with a smile on my face. I went to meet my other friend from church at a fundraising dinner and talked with her and the Pastor and his wife and I stayed with a smile on my face. I came home watched TV, laid down in pain but when Sammy would ask I would answer him with a smile on my face saying it hurts a little. I barely was able to sleep but I noticed I still had that same smile on my face.

Readers most of you know me. Most of you know that when you see me there is always a smile on my face. I realized that even though I do not mean it I seem to be plastic. I know I need to feel the impact of this. This diagnosis is not a death sentence but it is not going to be a cake walk either. I need to be better about my ability to handle what is thrown at me. I ask that each of you hold me accountable to my feelings. I can not continue always having this smile on my face. I know my friends and my family love me enough to allow me to break down and deal with what I am facing so why do I continue to act like all is ok with this smile on my face? Please if you see me tell me, tell me that I need to allow it all to hit me now so later when I do have that smile on my face it is genuine and not because I am doing it without realizing it.

Romans 8:28 tells us this: "And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose."ESV  I know I love my God strongly, firmly and completely so I need to trust in God to take care of me and my emotions. I need him to help me feel what I need to feel.

Thank you for joining me in this journey readers. I know for those of you who are reading this you know that I am writing this as my coping mechanism and I thank you for continuing to follow along with me. And let me end this with my favorite Bible verse ever: "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me" Philippians 4:13 NKJV

Thank you readers.

Be blessed in HIM!