Medical providers may have killed me.

 I had some breast changes about a year ago- maybe longer. I eventually became concerned, and went to my gyno. She performed a breast exam, and found no issues. I told her that I was still worried about it, and that mammograms kind of feel worthless to me. They always come back “clean”, but with a disclaimer letter that says I have dense breast tissue and that mammograms might miss any changes or areas of concern. She said that she would order a breast ultrasound, so that we could get a clearer picture of what’s going on, and to have as a “baseline” if any changes should happen in the future.

The appointment was made with SIRA. I arrived, went into the room, and the lady had me get ready for a mammogram. I inquired about the ultrasound, and she said they couldn’t do one. I explained that my doctor had ordered one and that I was supposed to be scheduled for it. I told her there had been changes, and we wanted to make absolutely sure nothing was missed. She then said that not only could they NOT do the ultrasound, but if there were reasons for concern then they couldn’t do the mammogram, either. They sent me home and told me someone would call me.

A day (week? month? 2020 is a blur) or two later, someone from SIRA called me. They refused to do the ultrasound that I wanted and my doctor ordered. They said I would have to do a “diagnostic mammogram”, which is more involved than a standard mammogram, and if THAT found something THEN they would do an ultrasound.

I went back to SIRA and had the diagnostic mammogram. The man who reads them came to the room shortly after. He said the scans were very, very thorough, and they were all completely normal. There were absolutely no issues at all. I again expressed concerns that I’d  had some weird changes, and some pain. I was concerned that these changes aligned with a rare type of breast cancer, but  he assured me that there was absolutely nothing out of the ordinary going on, and that any changes were simply “age related”. He said if there was anything wrong he would have found it.

He refused to do an ultrasound.

A week (day? month?) or two later, I got my official letter in the mail. It said that the scans didn’t show anything abnormal, BUT…I have extremely dense breast tissue and a traditional mammogram may not be able to see everything.

😐

So…yeah.

Hopefully, this is nothing, but…I don’t think it is. So my best hope now is that the concerns from a year ago were a total coincidence, and that cancer hasn’t been just freely mutating/spreading in my body for the last year.