I still remembered 12 September very clearly. I went for my appointment at Hospital ‘H’ praying that everything would turn out well. The moment I stepped into the Doctor’s room, he took out my mammogram and ultrasound which I did few days earlier for the lump in my breast and he started telling me. The report said that it is cancer. You see the word here ‘BI-RADS 5’. It meant cancer. I was stunned and confused because not much of explanation was given to me and suddenly you tell me that it was cancer. The doctor turned around and looked at me again, he said I will do a biopsy for you right now and the preliminary result will be out in 45 mins. He told me to go to a room further down the corridor to wait for him.
I walked to the room and waited for my name to be called. Even though the wait was not long but it seems like forever to me. I went in the room, the door was open, the nurse pulled the curtain and them asked me to undress my top and then covered up my right breast as the lump was in my left. While waiting for the doctor to come, there were nurses walking in to the room, talking, taking medical supplies with the door open and just a curtain pulled halfway. I felt like a piece of meat waiting to be slaughtered. When the doctor came in, he made me felt even more so like one. He brought in two interns, one a local student and the other an exchange student from China. He was telling them how generous he was compared to the other doctors as he will be giving me more local anesthesia so that I don’t feel the pain from the biopsy. He told me the sound of the tool he would be using to draw out the tumor will be loud so NOTHING to be afraid of. He then proceed to draw out the cells from the tumors once, the second time he asked the local intern ‘to try’. The intern was unsure and he said the tumor is so big, just feel it then push the needle in and draw out. All these were said and done in front of my face, in the room whereby nurses were walking in and out taking medical suppliers. When the procedure was done, the doctor told me to wait for 45 mins and he would give me the results of the preliminary report.
At this point of time, I was already at the verge of breaking down. I didn’t know who I can talk to. I texted my friend who was engaged at that time, I then texted another friend who was working in Hospital ‘H’ and she came down to meet me for a while. The moment she sat down, I tried to tell her why I was there, tears start to stream down my face non stop. I had to calm myself down before telling her the whole story. Shortly after I received a call from the clinic saying the results was out and I could go back now to see the doctor. My friend accompanied me to see the doctor and get the results. He then said it’s confirmed. I need you to go and do two more tests and then friday come back to see me.
My whole world collapsed and my mind went blank. After we came out of the doctor’s office, my friend sent me to the taxi stand, I called my sister and told her the news and I could not stop crying. I was lost and did not know what to do. Thank God, my sister was on the phone with me. She told me to cancel my impending trip to bring students overseas and get someone else to take over. Then we can slowly work things out from there. I remembered my sister’s words very clearly: ” Mei Mei, its okay to cry. You don’t have to act strong in front of me or anyone else. If you want to cry, you cry. Just let it out.”
That was what I needed most at that point of time.
Explanation of some terms in my blog:
BI-RADS- Breast Imaging Reporting and Data System
It is a category scale to tell doctors of what they found on the mammogram.
BI-RADS 5- Usually 95% of such cases, the tumors in the breast are malignant.
(Source: http://breast-cancer.ca/bi-rads/)
Journey of Wendy 