Throat Chakra Girl

-George Will

As a child, I was the kid who tested patience, pushed boundaries, and just had to do the thing you had been told not to do.

So as I went to my ultrasound to see just how big my new found friend was, I knew I was going to push for information my ultrasound technician was obligated not to give me. No harm, no foul, right?

I laid down on the crinkly, noisy paper, and took some deep breaths. Everything about medical offices makes my blood pressure shoot up until I can hear my heart beating in my ears.

“Think positive”, my husband had told me that morning. “Everything will be fine.”

He was always so sure, and yet, I knew, based on my exhausting brain calculations, that there were precisely eleventy-seven ways this could turn out, and at least three of them ending with my demise.

When my ultrasound was done, I decided to see what bits of information I could get from my technician, something that would put my mind at ease. Patience has never been my virtue.

“Did you see anything?”

“Oh yes. The nodule is quite large. Actually, come closer to me. Oh! I’m surprised you can’t see it when I look at you!”

She must have seen my shock.

“You are the one that discovered this, yes?”

“No, my endocrinologist did. It is really that big that you thought you could be visually able to see it?”

“I thought maybe you could. It’s not too big. You will get the report shortly.”

I just had to dig for information, didn’t I? I felt worse leaving than I had going in.

-Don Marquis

I’ve been a registered massage therapist for 18 years. My profession is intimate, and has made me privy to all kinds of knowledge, and information. I have clients of all races, religions, and sexual orientations. A very diverse group, that as a collective, has been a plethora of knowledge.

Last year a regular client of mine came to see me. We both have a thyroid condition called hypothyroidism, and she too, works in healthcare. She asked when I would be seeing my endocrinologist next. When I told her that I didn’t have an endocrinologist, she said I should be seeing one annually with the condition I have.

I went to my physician with that information and she sent off a referral. As a seasoned procrastinator, I thought I was being proactive for once.

Months later I was sitting in a stiflingly hot room, in front of a tiny man in a two piece suit. During his intake, he asked if I had temperature regulation issues, whether I typically feel hot or cold. I decided to make a joke of it, as I looked over at the draft stopper placed along the door’s base, keeping even the slightest bit of air from coming through, “well, I am typically cold, except for right now”. He didn’t laugh.

He wanted to examine my thyroid and I felt my anxiety taking hold. She can be such a sneaky bitch, rearing her head at the most inopportune times. I couldn’t figure out why I was anxious, it was just standard procedure lite, yet here I was, stress sweating. Picturing my sister teasing me about ending up with swamp ass, or swass, as she affectionately calls it.

After the exam he has me sit down, and tells me he wants me to return in 3 months. He gives me a requisition form for blood work, and an ultrasound. It is then that he tells me he felt a mass on my thyroid. Very nonchalantly. He continues on as if time hasn’t stopped for him, as it had for me.

“Hold on, can you back up a minute? You felt something on my thyroid?”

“Yes, there is a nodule on the right side.”

“Should I be concerned about that?”

“Well that is why I am sending you for an ultrasound.”

I walked out of that room wondering if my idea of being proactive had been a ruse, after all.