Fine Lines - Part 2

Results day...

There is a fine line between pretending nothing is wrong while admitting to a small part of yourself that you are in fact absolutely bricking it.

Driving down to the hospital the boyfriend and I were very quiet. Arriving at the hospital I asked him to wait in the car as I figured I'd be out pretty quickly, no point in going to the hassle of parking, I was confident I'd be out in 20 minutes. Half an hour later having worn out the pages of the magazine I wasn't reading I walked in to see my consultant smiling at me.



"You are certainly walking better than last week"


"Yes" I replied, I'm feeling much better thank you.


"You have breast cancer"


"No I haven't"


"You have breast cancer"


Right. Quite shocking that when you've been in denial for the best part of a week or is that a month? The boyfriend needed to be fetched, I can't remember what they said they needed to do next, more needles, a sample of my lymph nodes, nothing was going in, nothing. Was I with anyone? Yes, the boyfriend, but I needed to go to him, I couldn't let the nurse try and find him, not with this news. They carried on talking but I was sort of listening and sort of not, procedures and details and scans I needed were discussed but the conversation just stayed in that room, hanging in the atmosphere. I did not know what was the right thing to do, I was worried about taking it too seriously in case it wasn't, and I was worried about laughing it off in case it was. No information was going in. The sympathetic expressions on the nurse and the consultant made me cry but not because I felt like crying I just seemed to have no control over it.

I went outside and saw the boyfriend leaning against the car enjoying the warmth and the sunshine, he hadn't seen me and as I walked towards him I willed him not to look at me, I walked slowly and quietly wanting him to enjoy the moment before I wrecked his head and heart with my news. He just held me, almost too tightly and I let him, I pretended not to notice his tears and off he went to park the car being a practical sort of bloke.

Sitting with the consultant and the nurse and the boyfriend going through all the different procedures and possible treatments I started to feel a bit removed from everything, surreal, unreal, it didn't feel as if it was about me at all. The turning point came when I was told that during my lumpectomy I would be injected with a blue dye, the consultant was very serious as he told us this. We needed to be prepared for the fact that I would be a sort of blue / grey colour for about a week. Nothing to worry about just better to know in advance. It was inappropriate to laugh but I wanted to, I wanted to laugh loudly in the face of it all... Would I suit being grey? After all it's one of my favourite colours to wear, I've my own version of fifty shades of it in my wardrobe. Would anyone notice or would they just assume I was 'off colour'? In that moment, as the shock wrapped itself around me so did the blackest sense of humour. Cancer? I was having none of it.


I spent the next few days being either very bad indeed (black humour which didn't go down well with everyone) or being terribly reassuring and grown up about it all. Often my reaction depended on the people I told... Telling someone close to you that you have cancer is difficult, for them to know what to say back is just as tough, another of those fine lines to be treaded carefully. I listened to all the stories of those who had a friend or knew of a friend of a friend who made a full recovery, I was told countless times that the success rate was remarkable, one in eight women have breast cancer apparently, frankly I began to feel like those who didn't have it were missing out if you were going to have cancer then this was the one to have. I made jokes about it safe in the super absorbent layer of shock I was wearing, enjoying the effect the darkest sense of humour had on my friends and family. The boyfriend struggled with even saying the word until I became angry and yelled at him that we would not be frightened by this thing, it was just a word, it would not take over everything to the extent that we could not even say it's name.

My third visit to the hospital that week was for another MRI, this time I'd be lying on my front. Egghead again, I cracked a joke about being back in because I loved it so much, he looked at me and apologised for not recognising me but he really was having the week from hell. I figured it wasn't a competition and as he didn't ask me about my week I kept quiet. Another needle and another unflattering gown. No Irish this time but they did turn the volume up this time, this was much worse, I had to lie still listening to really bad pop music and with no way of turning it off the loud bangs from the machine came as a blessed relief.

Four days after the diagnosis and the shock finally wore off and the reality hit me, it wasn't pleasant. It doesn't matter how you dress it up, it is what it is. I know that there is a high recovery rate, I know that everyone knows someone who is absolutely fine, but every aspect about this damned thing is serious, painful and uncomfortable; from the constant puncture of the needles as you take test after test or have scan after scan, to the contraptions you have to shove yourself into. I'm not complaining, not yet, just making the point that I am here and a full recovery is all the way over there, and for now that is taking up a lot of room in my head.