Can I Please Have A Doctor's Certificate For Tuesday?

So what happened next?

Well, as I said, it was a Friday afternoon and I was at a clinic having mammograms and ultrasounds. I wasn't that worried about the whole procedure, as I had regularly self examined my boobies (I wasn't the only one that had given them a thorough examination either just quietly...) and just a few weeks earlier I had been to the skin Doctor for a full body check of my moles, and I had passed with flying colours.

So I figured I had nothing to worry about and was basically just indulging my Sister #1.

There was quite a flurry of activity buzzing around me, but I wasn't taking much notice. I knew I had nothing to worry about, and frankly as I hadn't had these tests done in years and years I didn't realize that this wasn't just the usual.

I remember getting asked to move from machine to machine, and then back again. I thought they were just being thorough.

Then when I was getting changed a nurse came in and told me that my GP wanted to see me to discuss my results. I walked out to reception and said;
"Why would he want to see me tonight? I already have an appointment to see him on Monday"

I was then told that he wanted to see me straight away as he didn't want me to 'fret' over the weekend about my results.

As Dr Luke is an ABSOLUTE darling, I thought this was just him being his usual sweetheart self.

Still, no major alarm bells going off.

As it was after 5pm by now and Dr Luke was on the other side of town, I told the receptionist that due to peak hour I wouldn't make it there in time, so I would just see him on Monday.

She told me he was waiting and would be keeping the surgery open until I arrived.

I went outside, jumped in the car and got on the phone to Sister #1 and started bitching and moaning that I had to cross town, in the rain and during Friday peak hour to get my results. By this stage she was starting to get a bit nervous about the whole thing. I suppose I must have been too, but I honestly can't remember feeling that way. I thought at worst I might have had a blocked duct or something as basic as that. But realistically, I didn't think there was even a hint of a problem. SURELY I would have known if something was up.

So I arrived at the surgery, to find that Dr Luke was waiting for me. The surgery was closed. I walked into his office and sat down.

He looked at me and said "there is no easy way to tell you this, but you have breast cancer"

I sat there, waiting for him to tell me that it was just a small blip and could be taken out in a minor procedure.

He then said "It is advanced"

Not knowing what the hell this meant I just sat there. No tears, no emotion.

He then went on to tell me what I had and what would be happening going forward.

I still hadn't said a word.

I then asked me to say something, and all I said was "I'm waiting for the punchline..."

He then told me he couldn't believe how calm I was and I just repeated that I was waiting for a punchline.

He told me there was no punchline and that I had a "really hard time ahead of me". He then asked me if there was anyone he could call, so we called Sister #1 and spoke to her on speaker phone.

He then told me that he wanted to send me to a particular specialist. She's expensive, but the best, he told me. Throw in that she only takes limited patients and he mightn't be able to get me in and I was SOLD!

Oh Dr Luke...you know me so well...

I had a meeting with my boss on the upcoming Tuesday, so I asked for a Doctor's Certificate as I wanted to be in top form for my meeting, and with a Doctor's Certificate I could put it back by a few days until after I had got all this pesky boob problem out of the way.

He looked at me and said "Tuesday? You want a certificate for Tuesday? I don't think you understand, you wont be going back to work for quite some time..."

Yeah sure... As if!

Some Days Are Diamonds, Some Days Are just Bloody Hard

So, most of the time I only tell you guys about the good times. For many reasons. Basically because who wants to hear about the scary, sad, pain full, dull and mundane bits. The other reason is, is that if by some further bitch-slap of nature I don't pull through this, I only would ever want to be remembered as the loud pain in the arse I was before this heinous thing started attacking my body.

So today you all get a lecture!

I have been banging on to ALL of you ever since my diagnosis about going to see your Doctor and getting a FULL body check up. Now I am discovering many of you have been telling me little porky lies and have said you have had them, when in actual fact you have not. The SAME excuse keeps on coming back to me.

"I don't have time"

It will take you less than an hour of your life...


Well folks let me tell you a little thing about time. I have not worked since July, I have no hair and have just spent the last 3 hours organising my medical bills. I am already up to $20K out of pocket in these bills alone. I also have no idea when I will be able to go back to work, when I will get the all clear and when my fucking hair will start growing back.

So, still don't have time???

Random Bits

So, I'm still trying to work out how to organize this blog, as writing retrospectively could be tricky. But here are a few things you may not know about the 'special' joys of Cancer;

*When your eyelashes fall out, they fall into your eyeballs. AND HURT
*You don't have to shave your legs for months on end
*Chemo make you stink like a rotting junkie. You cannot get the smell off your skin, out of your clothes, bed linen or furnishings
*Wigs have to be so tight that they don't fall off when you turn your head or look down
*You have to wash your hands so often that you start to REALLY resent it
*You have to become obsessive about others washing their hands and very quickly discover which ones of your friends do or don't wash their hands after using the bathroom
*Being bald feels fantastic
*Being a bald chick isn't that fantastic
*Buying 2 very expensive wigs online after not having slept for three straight days is just plain stupid
*Finally you have the bikini line that you have spent a fortune on at the beauticians trying to achieve, but now no one wants to look at it
*A wig on a stand looks like a severed head
*Chemo is a liquid that is put through you much the same as any other drip
*Chemo makes you pee BRIGHT red, like undiluted cordial, for 3 days after
*Cancer is really boring, long, tedious and lonely
*Sometimes cheese tastes really yummy, like rediculously extra yummy, 20 minutes later it may taste like poison
*When you open the fridge door and bend down the cold breeze on your bald head makes you giggle
*Your finger nails split vertically and not horizontally, so you have to wear nail polish to try and stop them from splitting at all times
*You have to brush your teeth after eating anything and rinse with a vile salt/antiseptic wash
*Wine makes mouth ulcers feel better
*Chemo can sometimes make you get 'special feelings' in the ladies-down-stairs-department. Which is odd as you are in a room filled with strangers
*There is such a thing as nostril thrush
*Drinking 4 litres of water a day is basically a full time job

Who would have thunk it???

I'm somewhat normal, in my thirties and have recently been diagnosed with Breast Cancer. My blog won't be every ones cup of tea as I am dealing with this with my usual fairly inappropriate sense of humour.  The name of the blog should have made that fairly clear... Unless you are looking for an amputee fetish site, by which case you will be pretty disappointed with the rest of this blog.

I'm that person that you know, that bizarre things happen to on a regular basis. As my best friend says "I only believe it because I'm there when it happens. It's always happening to you!?"

I am certainly no author, typist or speller and the discovery that there is such a thing as 'chemo-brain', is all part of my total disclosure. Insomnia is also my new friend, hence the blog. Oh and people keep on telling me I should be writing all this down. Apparently my Twitter and Facebook updates have been surprising to you all.

Well how did it start?

I was just happily skipping along in life. I had a new job that I adored, I had just lost 35kgs (more on that later), was happily dating a bevvy of boys after having my heart ripped out of my chest the year before (probably not more about that later), I had a great house in a funky suburb in Melbourne, amazing family and friends and a social life that I lived at a cracking pace. Life was bloody good.

I had put on a TONNE of weight and had been working like a demon to loose it, and I was going along well with that. As I had rather large boobies (yes that is the technical term) for the first time ever the bloody things were sagging like nobodies business and I HATED the way they were looking. I was spending a LOT of time bitching about what shape they were and how I was planning on a boob job. So as I am/was the girl that always wore her top undone to her navel. My theory being that if the boys were looking at my boobs, they weren't looking at the size of my arse. A theory that I had proven time and time again over the years...

So here I was on a Friday afternoon, I had finished work early and had made myself an appointment at a local tattoo parlour to have my nipple pierced. I must add that I had had my nipple (discreetly) pierced for years and years and now because my boobs were so viley sagging the nipple bar was pointing on an odd angle I wanted it re-pierced to try and vaguely make it look more symmetric.

I bounced along, with a smirk on my face (I don't look like someone that would have a piercing) into said tattoo parlour and proudly presented my nipple to Paul-The-Piercer. He took one look at it and said "Ummmm, lady, I don't want to alarm you but I can't pierce that. You need to go and see a Doctor straight away. You've got something REALLY wrong with your boob". I was like "no shit sherlock, I know I have something wrong with my boobs THEY SAG!!!" He said" That's not it, you look like you have some really big lumps".

I tried to negotiate with him, but on this day my somewhat epic negotiating skills let me down and he just refused point blank to do it. Paul was  the first person on this journey to help save my life. Dramatic? Sure, but true.

So I went outside and phoned #1 Sister (#1 of 3) and pissing myself with laughter told her that the piercer refused to re-pierce my nipple. I bitched that CLEARLY even he thought they were too ugly to bother piercing. I told her what he said. She asked when I was going to go to the Doctors and I said I wasn't. I said that I think I would know if I had a lump in my breast. #1 Sister lives in another city and 15 minutes later called me back to tell me that she had made me an appointment down the road and I had 10 minutes to get there. Frankly, I wasn't that interested but I was actually driving down the road that the clinic was in. If you know my #1 Sister you will appreciate that I figured it was easier just to go rather than have her banging on about it for months until I did it.

It was 4pm and by 6pm I was being told that I had advanced Breast Cancer.

BOOM

No warning

No negotiating

The night before I had been indulging in an 8 course degustation meal with matching wines. The weekend before I had shagged a new guy.

WHAT THE HELL??