Boy, oh Boy, What a day!!

I had a core needle breast biopsy performed today. Holy Cow!!! I have to say that experience rates up their with the ones that I don't care to *ever* repeat. EVER!! It was nice to sleep in an extra hour as I tossed and turned all night. I can't wait until the hormones level back out so I can sleep without the Lunesta. At 5am, I noticed that my joints were hurting much less--that's after just one dose of the new meds. Anyway, it snowed last night and was still dumping this morning. So I didn't have to drive in to town with rush hour traffic. Good thing that K told me before he left, but I really needed the extra time I planned for. It's a good thing that I opted to not go to work before my appointment. I took my MIL with me. She was great company. Since we got there early, we stopped at the gift shop and bought a couple of neat finds. I bought the bear with a salmon in his mouth and a holly leaf on his neck to put in the guest bathroom for the holiday decorations. I also found a really neat ladybug pin to wear on my coat. I didn't even think about whether the u/s tech would be male or female until a male tech walked out and called my name. Ugh! I've lost all modesty. I've bared it all to male techs. And I've never given birth. I was told once that you loose all modesty after having given birth. I can tell you that you do after have Endometriosis and Infertility too. He was really nice though. After the tech performed his scans, he left the room to find the radiologist. I had watched him work and new that what he was seeing wasn't exactly the best as the lumps were grey (dense). He came back and told me that he paged the radiologist to let her know that I needed a biopsy performed. *sigh* He showed me the snap shots and explained that three of the four larger dense area had smooth margins (sides) and the fourth and largest one did not. It had very rough edges and was about 1/2 inch in diameter. While we waited for the radiologist, he asked if I wanted to stay in the room or go for a cup of coffee. I opted to get dressed and go sit with my MIL and tell her what was going on. She was great. She kept telling me all the good stories she knew about ppl who've either had non-cancerous biopsies or survived breast cancer. I told her that breast cancer really didn't scare me so much as loosing the opportunity to adopt did. I mean cancer is scary no matter how you look at it, but I know that breast cancer caught early has a great survival rate. The thing with adoption is that you have to be cancer free for 5 years before you can adopt. That would make me 38-40yo. My MIL finally understood why this has me so worried. She held my hand and told me that we'll just pray that the biopsy comes back clean and we can move on with the adoption. Everyone keeps pointing out that I've been through so much over the last year (and last three years). They say that this will turn out just fine b/c God doesn't give us more than we can handle. I have to say that I'm more than done with medical procedures. I'm more than done with anything that involves a needle. I'm more than done with waiting for my turn to be a mom. I went back into the room and we waited some more for the radiologist. The tech told me her name and I realized that it was the radiologist who performed my Hysterosalpingogram (HSG) last year. He told her that when she arrived. She was disappointed to learn that I did not get pregnant and finally had to have a hysterectomy. I did tell her that we were working on adopting from China. She thought that was neat. She explained the procedure and then started to numb things up with the Lidacaine. I like that she gives you a little bit and then waits a few second and gives you the rest. That makes the burning part so much better to deal with. That was the easiest part of the whole procedure. I was in no way prepared for what was to come next. The radiologist had to literally jab me with the biopsy needles to get them through the fibrocystic breast tissue. Not even the lump would cooperate and was very hard to puncture. She used 18 & 16 guage needles. Thank God for Lidacaine because she made SIX attempts at getting a two good cores. A friend of mine likened the proceed to being shot with a nail gun. I laughed and told her that it's another procedure obviously invented by a man. I asked the radiologist how often these types of lesions/lumps/tumor (all were used today) turn out to be cancerous. She said that 30% do and that's high enough to warrant a biopsy. That means I have a 70% chance that this is just a funky looking fibroadenoma (benign tumor). The odds are still in my favor, but I've been through the odds game before and lost. I really hope that I don't loose this one. I really pray that the Lord will spare me this and let me go on to adopt and be a mom. So far the pain meds that I'm taking for my other conditions are keeping the biopsy site from hurting. I was surprised that I'm not allowed to shower or lift heavy things today. I never realized that you had restrictions after what really seems like a simple procedure. No worries, I plan to park my rear on the couch tonight and just rest. So that was just my morning. I was at work by 1pm. Boy, oh boy! What a day!