“Happy” Anniversary
My oncologist and I are approaching our 4-year anniversary.
One word to describe the feeling — bittersweet.
Here’s why
1. I have an oncologist
2. We have been “seeing” each other for almost 4 years
3. I am here to write about our anniversary
In October of 2017, life got real lifey. At the top of this story, I would like to express extreme gratitude that I am stubborn, that I know my body and that I pushed. Thank you Sky Daddy.
While at work, standing in front of a customer, I felt what I knew was me bleeding. I also felt an abundance of concern, my period wasn’t due and I am no irregular girl, well my cycle isn’t anyway. That was the start of a series of doctor and hospital visits, tests and scans. I was poked and prodded. I was told that it was hormones, I was told it was age. I had exams I couldn’t pronounce and repeat occurrences of those I could. We found a baby cyst, they ran all the blood I could give, I told doctors I didn’t believe them and then we had a diagnosis. That too, came with its fair share of drama.
Imagine it being a week full of yet another set of appointments searching for answers and now having to add on a new appointment because this nurse is telling you your doctor wants you to come in tomorrow to get your results. Now, this same doctor put his little camera in your juicy land of wonder and said,
“Oh, everything looks fine. We’ll do the biopsy anyway, but it should come back fine. I’ll call you either way”.
So I am unconcerned and frankly Miss, I do not want to come in for him to tell me what he already told me.
“Can we just talk over the phone?”
“I’ll see what the doctor says and call you back”
The day goes on and this nurse still hasn’t called me back. I am tired (physically and mentally), I am mildly annoyed because if I must go in, I need to set up my time off and let’s not forget that life is real lifey at this time. I call back
“Hi, this is Ms. Bowles calling back to see if I need to actually come in, we spoke earlier and you said you would get back to me.”
She is having big chat in the background, being large unprofessional and adding to my annoyance.
“What’s your name again?” I give it. She has some more background chatter.
“And what is your date of birth?” I give this too. And you guessed it, more chatter.
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She must find me now. Something has made me important now. She must be paying attention now because she loses what I assume is her game face. I know this because I hear it in her voice.
“Oh No, Jessica, you absolutely have to come in to the office!”
“Okay, I’ll see you guys tomorrow.”
You raggedy bitch!!! Like bottom of the barrel, piss poor client care, I should really slap you, unprofessional ass, oooh I’m so mad, distracted and stupid, raggedy bitch.
Those were my thoughts, well some of them. I didn’t need to go in to know that my news was not good news.
That doctor and I didn’t last long because early in the game he was ready to take my uterus and be done. What you won’t do is make shortchange of this black woman and take the easy way out because me reproducing isn’t of importance to you. We had one procedure together and then I met my oncologist.
Why we love him
1. He came highly recommended (thanks Kimmy and Kimmy’s friend)
2. He is part of a hospital of excellence
3. He has the same name as my son
4. He is about preservation
5. The first thing he said to me was “They wanted you to get a hysterectomy, didn’t they?”
I welled up immediately after that statement because I knew I mattered to him. He was here to help me not only conquer this hurdle but do it while still preserving the things that were important to me. As my good friend says, he is now a part of the squad.
He did my second procedure and we’ve been hanging out ever since. Every 6 months, we have a date. They are good dates. Happy dates. Hey buddy, kind of dates and then something very circa October 2017 happened, almost 3 years to the date and we are back to ground zero.
I knew it was back.
When I told him the changes, he looked at me and said “you know we have to do the tests right?”
I knew. Just like I knew then.
We’ve done some things to get it back to hidden, but haven’t been successful, yet. I have some decisions to make, and my doctor has been phenomenal at helping me. I really couldn’t have asked for a better person to be in my corner, I mean well God, but He’s been there.
We had our new year date today. He wished me a Happy New Year, he wished me a happy birthday (it was 2 weeks ago), and then coupled with discovering my new age, he realized we had an anniversary coming up. He realized how long we’ve “been together”. He said “4 years next month, we’ve managed to keep the uterus this long. Let’s see what we can do”
My oncologist and I are approaching our 4-year anniversary. I am a decent amount of cervix lighter, I have some added ouches, there are some stresses that have happened in our relationship and a good deal of tears were shed.
Next month my oncologist and I celebrate our 4-year anniversary and thank God I am here to write about it.
