Turning 40 comes with many glorious things. You care less about your body shape, you truly say anything you want most days, you feel a bit wiser than you were in your 20’s when you thought wearing a bodysuit was a good idea. But the biggest milestone that occurs when you hit the big 4-0 is the famous trip to the mammogram machine.
Public service announcement: Mammograms save lives. It’s stupid not to get one. Seriously, it’s just plain stupid. Go get one and make sure you stay healthy not just for yourself but for those that love you.
Now, back to my story.
So let me tell you what it’s like to get a mammogram. Not the scientific version, but the real crap you need to know.
1st thing you need to know: Don’t wear deodorant. I, of course, failed to remember this detail the nurse told me when I scheduled my appointment. So for five minutes before the xray, I was topless in a doctor’s bathroom scrubbing foam soap on my pits to wash away any trace of deodorant. For the rest of the morning I smelled like Dial hand sanitizer every time I lifted my arm slightly.
2nd thing you need to know: You’ll never want to put your top back on. When I got into the changing room, the nurse opened a magical warming machine and removed the hottest and softest scrub-like-tie top for me to wear. It felt like a marsupial had wrapped its cozy, fuzzy arms around me and let me sleep in its furry bosom.
3rd thing you need to know: The machine was definitely created by a man. No woman would ever think of a system where a cold metal plate would be used to crush the most beloved parts of our body. If a woman invented a mammogram machine, it would be covered in crushed velvet and caress our breasts until we were ready to smoke a cigarette afterwards.
4th thing you need to know: It’s not that bad. It takes four pictures and each picture pinches pretty hard for about 3-5 seconds where you think about crushing the nurse’s head in that cranking machine. But then it is done and you realize that she’s a nice old grandmother who is probably jealous that your boobs don’t touch the ground yet.
5th thing you need to know: They don’t give you a “get out of sex card” at the end. It’s not like a pap swear where you can work that stuff for a day or two and tell the husband that you are sore and couldn’t possibly be on top. Nope, your boobs feel fine five minutes later. Heck, they probably would welcome a caressing touch after the metal plate of hell just crashed upon them.
So if you are 40 or have breast cancer in you family, go get one. And the best part is that I got to wait in the waiting room with all the pregnant folks who were going to have their first ultrasound. As I drank fully caffeinated coffee and thought about the cocktail I was going to drink that night.
