The phone call

I never really thought much about my body, I mean what went on inside my body, until I got the phone call.

I’ve learned since to appreciate the intricate patchwork of organs and hormones and neurons all connected in a delicate balance and tucked away nicely under your skin, so you don’t see it. Believe me, you don’t want to see it. I accidentally had a glance at a monitor in an operating room, but I’m getting ahead of myself.

I didn’t really even think much about my body when I was pregnant. Sure, I read every text book I could get my hands on, as if that would ensure a passing grade, and most things played out chapter by chapter (except of course when I got severe preenclampsia—another story entirely). I was busy with work then, and now I was busy with the children.

So when I picked up the phone – in the middle of bath time – all three girls in the tub pretending they were in swimming lessons and me dicing the last of the onions for chicken catchatorre, careful not to accidentally wipe my eyes with the stinging residue on my hands – I was not prepared.

“Mrs. Scott?”

“Yes, that’s me” I answered, peeking into the bathroom to check on the girls, even though my evening helper had just arrived and was watching them. They were playing the “guess who I am bubble game” where they put the soapy circles on their face and you had to name what they were. It’s usually a snowman or vanilla ice cream cone.

“It’s Dr. Kahn. From the clinic. I just got your test back.” She was talking about the gastro clinic, that’s what I had nicknamed the gastrointestinal unit. We hadn’t cliqued. When I told her I had been struggling with IBF for years, her pen kept moving across the page, not looking up.

I had gone in that morning for what I thought was a routine scan. Thinking back, I probably should have been worried. With each pregnancy, at my 20-week scan, the radiologists were fascinated with an extra loop of something where it shouldn’t be. One pointed it out to me.

“See that? It’s right there,” and he pointed at a pulsating blob amongst a screen of shapes of varying degrees of greyness. He called in the consultant and they went on discussing it in medical jargon, as if I wasn’t there. Now I knew what my mother must feel like when I talked about things like search engine optimisation and Web 2.0 around her.

“You should really have this checked out when you aren’t pregnant,” they told me when they returned from their huddle. Well, for those of you who know me, I was pretty much pregnant for five years straight (that includes two miscarriages and three live births).

So here I was, doing what I was told, getting it checked out. And now this doctor that I really didn’t like was on the phone.

“As I said, your tests have come back. And I’m concerned. It shows a growth by your ovaries, about nine centimeters long.” Fading in the background, I could hear the girls arguing about possession of a bath toy.

“Nine centimeters? What’s that in inches?” I was never good with metrics, I’m more of an Imperial girl.

“About four inches, the size of a small melon.”

Pause, trying to digest what she just said.

“Should I be worried?” my mind flashed back to the face on the technician, elevated in the room in a small corner, I had waved goodbye and had only got a half smile in return. Maybe he knew the cup was half empty, not half full.

“Yes. Now that we think it is related to your ovaries, I need to pass you over to your OBGYN.”

“OK, thanks for letting me know,” was all I could think to say, and my hand shook as I put down the phone.

Click.

And that was the last I heard for about a week.

Oh, and hubby was away on a business trip.

Photo credit: f chouse